CHAPTER CXLVI.

TWO UNPLEASANT LODGERS.

In the meantime certain little incidents had occurred in London, which

we must faithfully chronicle before we proceed with the adventures

of the newly married couple,--adventures, which, could Charles have

possibly foreseen----

But we were for a moment oblivious of the scenes that require our

attention in London, and which took place while Charles Hatfield and

Perdita were as yet on their way to Paris.

Charterhouse Square--situate between Aldersgate Street and St. John

Street (Smithfield)--has a mournful, gloomy, and sombre appearance,

which even the green foliage in the circular enclosure cannot

materially relieve. The houses are for the most part of antiquated

structure and dingy hue--the windows and front-doors are small--and,

pass by them when you will, you never behold a human countenance at any

one of the casements. The curtains and the blinds,--and, in the winter

time, glimpses of the fires burning in the parlours,--these are, to a

certain extent, symptoms that the houses are tenanted: but no farther

signs of the fact can be discovered. Often and often as we have passed

through that Square, we never beheld a soul coming out of, nor going

into, any one of the gloomy abodes: we have observed a baker’s boy

and a butcher’s ditto hurrying rapidly round--but never could satisfy

ourselves that either of them had any particular business there,

for they did not knock at a single door;--and on one--and only one

occasion--when we met a two-penny post-man in the Square, he seemed to

be as much astonished at finding himself in that quarter as we were to

encounter him there. As for the beadle--his occupation seems to consist

of lounging about, switching a cane, strolling into the Fox and Anchor

public-house, and chatting for half-an-hour at a time with the very

sober-looking porter of the Charter House.

There is a something really solemn and awful in the silence of that

Square,--not a silence and a repose which seem to afford relief to the

mind and rest to the ear after escaping from the tremendous din of

the crowded streets,--but a silence that strikes like a chill to the

heart. Whence arises this sensation?--is it because, while traversing

the Square, we are reminded that in the vast cloistral building to the

north are pent up eighty old men--the Poor Brothers of the Charter

House,--eighty denizens of a Protestant Monastery in the very heart

of civilised London,--eighty worn-out and decrepid persons who drag

out the wretched remnant of their lives beneath the iron sway of a

crushing ecclesiastical discipline! Does the silence of the Square

borrow its solemnity from that far more awful silence which reigns

within the Charter House itself,--a silence so awe-inspiring--so

dead--so tomb-like, that even in the noon of a hot summer-day, the

visitor shudders with a cold feeling creeping over him as he crosses

the cloistral enclosure!

The reader will probably remember that, when Mr. Bubbleton Styles

had propounded his grand Railway scheme to Captain O’Blunderbuss and

Mr. Frank Curtis, he gave each of those gentlemen a ten-pound note,

desiring them to take respectable lodgings, and refer, if necessary,

to him. We know not precisely how it happened that the gallant officer

and his friend should have selected Charterhouse Square as the place

most likely to suit them with regard to apartments; but thither they

assuredly did repair--and in that gloomy quarter did they hire three

rooms: namely, a parlour on the first floor, and two bed-chambers on

the second. The landlady of the house was a widow; and, having some

small pittance in the shape of regular income, eked out by letting

a portion of her abode. She was an elderly woman--tall, starch,

and prim--and very particular in obtaining good references--or, at

least, what she considered to be good ones--respecting any applicants

for her apartments; and therefore, previously to admitting Captain

O’Blunderbuss and Mr. Frank Curtis into her house, she had sought all

possible information concerning them at the hands of Mr. Styles. His

account was satisfactory, and the two gentlemen were thereupon duly

installed in their lodgings at Mrs. Rudd’s, Charterhouse Square.

The first two or three days passed comfortably enough, because the

captain and Frank, having ready money in their pockets, took their

dinner and supper--aye, and their grog too--at some convenient

tavern,--troubling Mrs. Rudd only in reference to their breakfast,

which she cheerfully prepared for them, because she thereby obtained

whole and sole controul over their groceries. She was a very pious

woman, and attended a Methodist Chapel regularly every Sunday; but

being, as she often expressed herself, “a lone widow,” she thought

there was no harm in using her lodgers’ tea, sugar, and butter for her

own repasts. “Heaven was very good to her,” she would often tell her

neighbours, “and enabled her to make the most of her little means:” she

might have added--“and of her lodgers’ also.”

The captain and Frank, however, soon began to find that their evening

entertainments at the tavern were very expensive; and, as they could

not again draw upon Mr. Styles for some time--all his resources being

required for the promotion of the railway--they resolved to economise.

The best method of carrying this object into effect, was to take their

dinner, supper, and poteen at home; and Mrs. Rudd, on being sounded

in respect to the plan, willingly assented--for the excellent woman

felt assured that her lodgers would not miss a slice or two off a cold

joint any more than they noticed the marvellous disappearance of their

groceries. So the captain and his friend became more domestic; and as

Frank did not get particularly drunk on the two first evenings, Mrs.

Rudd had no complaints to make.

But at last she began to suspect that she had some ground for doubting

the steadiness of her lodgers. It was on a Sunday evening, and the

worthy woman had just returned from chapel, where she had heard a most

refreshing and savoury discourse by the Reverend Mr. Flummery,--when,

on crossing the threshold of the house door, and while still ruminating

on the truly Christian manner in which the eloquent minister had

promised hell-flames to all heathens,--she was suddenly startled by

hearing a terrific noise proceeding from up-stairs.

She paused--and listened!

Yes: the sound _did_ emanate from above; and most strange sounds

they were, too. Deeply disgusted--nay, profoundly shocked at this

desecration of the Sabbath, Mrs. Rudd crept up stairs; and the nearer

she drew to the parlour-door, the more convinced did she become that

Captain O’Blunderbuss and Mr. Curtis were fighting a single combat

with the shovel and poker. The conflict was, however, only in fun:

for the clash of the fire-irons was accompanied by tremendous shouts

of laughter, and such ejaculations as these:--“There, be Jasus! I

have ye again, Frank! Blood and thunther, keep up your guar-r-d, man!

Now, would ye be afther a feint? Be the powers! and ye can’t touch

me at all, at all! Hit hard, me friend--niver mind the damned ould

poker-r-r--the ould woman is at chapel!”

Mrs. Rudd was astounded--stupefied. Was it possible that these were

the lodgers whom Mr. Styles--a respectable “City man”--had recommended

as the very patterns of quietness and steadiness? Why, if she had let

her rooms to two Bedlamites, things could not have been worse! She was

positively afraid to go in to remonstrate; and, having recovered the

use of those limbs which wonder had for several minutes paralysed, she

hurried down stairs to consider what was best to be done, while supping

off her racketty lodgers’ cold joint.

That same night Frank Curtis got so gloriously inebriated, that

he threw up his bed-room window and treated the whole Square to a

specimen of his vocal powers--singing some favourite Bacchanalian

song, and introducing the most terrific yells by way of variations.

The captain, who had also imbibed a little too much, soon after threw

up _his_ window, and exerted all the powers of _his_ lungs in chorus

with his friend; so that the deep, solemn, and awe-inspiring silence

of Charterhouse Square was broken in a fashion that seemed to surprise

the very echoes themselves. Without any figure of speech, it is

certain that the inhabitants were surprised; for their night, usually

passed in such death-like tranquillity, was unexpectedly and suddenly

“made hideous;” and several nervous old ladies, dwelling in the

neighbourhood, fancied that the frightful yells were warnings of fire,

and went off into strong hysterics.

Vainly did Mrs. Rudd knock first at the captain’s door--then at

Frank’s: they heard her not--or, if they did, took no heed of her

remonstrances;--and when the beadle, who had been aroused from his bed,

came and thundered at the front-door, the two lodgers simultaneously

emptied their water-pitchers on his head. Then, satisfied with this

exploit, they closed their windows and retired to rest.

When they descended to their parlour to breakfast in the morning, Mrs.

Rudd acquainted them, in a tone evincing the most violent concentration

of rage, that she could not possibly think of harbouring Captain

O’Blunderbuss and Mr. Curtis any longer. But, to her amazement, they

both swore that they were perfectly innocent of the disturbance of the

previous night,--alleging that they themselves were as much annoyed by

the row as the landlady herself. Mrs. Rudd could scarcely believe her

ears: had she been dreaming? No: the noise had really taken place--for

her lodgers admitted that they had heard it--though, to use a common

phrase, they swore “eyes and limbs” that they had not made it. However,

she gave them a week’s warning, and then calmly reminded them that a

week’s rent was already due; whereupon Captain O’Blunderbuss flew into

a terrific rage at the idea of “the maneness of the woman in spaking of

such a thrifle!” Mrs. Rudd was frightened, and turned in an appealing

manner to Mr. Frank Curtis, who declared point blank that the captain

was cashier, and that she must draw upon him: but, finding that the

gallant officer was a cashier without cash, Mrs. Rudd was compelled

to retire--muttering something about her being “a lone widow,” and

intimating a hope that the two weeks’ rent would be paid “all in a

lump” on the following Monday morning.

The captain and Mr. Curtis now completely threw off the mask. They

no longer affected even to be “steady, quiet men of regular habits,”

as Mr. Styles had represented them; but they drank poteen “till all

was blue,” as Frank Curtis said--or, in the language of the gallant

officer, “till they couldn’t see a hole through a lath-er.” The

disturbances they created at night were hideous; and poor Mrs. Rudd

received from all her neighbours the most positive threats that they

would indict her house as a nuisance. At last, in the depth of her

despair, she had recourse to that excellent man, the Reverend Mr.

Flummery; and the Reverend Mr. Flummery, having heard her sad tale,

undertook to go in person and remonstrate with “these men of Belial.”

Accordingly, one afternoon, just as the captain and Frank had finished

a couple of bottles of stout by way of giving themselves an appetite

for dinner, they were somewhat surprised when the parlour-door was

thrown open, and in walked a short, podgy, red-faced man, dressed in

deep black. Still more amazed were they when he announced himself

as the Reverend Emanuel Flummery, and stated that he had come to

remonstrate with them on their behaviour towards “a lone widow.” The

captain, winking at Curtis, desired the minister to be seated, and

proposed to discuss the business over another bottle of stout. His

reverence thought there was something so affable in the offer, that it

would be churlish to refuse it; and he accordingly gave his assent. The

stout was produced; and Mr. Flummery, being thirsty and hot, enjoyed it

excessively.

He then began a long remonstrance with the two gentlemen--the gist of

which was that Mrs. Rudd would be very much obliged to them if they

would pay their rent and remove to other lodgings. The captain and

Frank pretended to listen with attention; and the reverend minister,

finding them in such a tractable humour, as he supposed, did not choose

to mar the harmony of the interview by declining a second bottle of

stout. Talking had renewed his thirst--and, moreover, if there were one

special beverage which the Reverend Emanuel Flummery loved more than

another, it was Guinness’s stout. Accordingly, he emptied his tumbler,

and then continued his remonstrance and his representations, in which,

however he was cut short by a sudden pain in the stomach--doubtless

produced by the effervescent malt liquor. The captain was prompt with

a remedy; and Mr. Flummery had swallowed a good dram of whiskey

before an eye could twinkle thrice. Thus cheered, and finding the

two gentlemen most docile and respectful, his reverence consented

to partake of a hot glass of toddy with them, just to convince them

that he was inclined to be friendly;--and this one glass led to a

second--and then Frank Curtis cunningly brewed him a third, while the

reverend minister was expatiating upon the good qualities of Mrs. Rudd.

In fine, Mr. Emanuel Flummery became so much disguised in liquor,

that, when he took his leave, he swore the captain and Frank Curtis

were two excellent gentlemen--begged them not to put themselves to any

inconvenience in moving--and assured them that he would make it all

right with the landlady.

[Illustration]

Mrs. Rudd, however, was mightily shocked when she beheld the condition

in which the reverend gentleman presented himself at her own

parlour-door; and she could indeed scarcely believe her eyes. But when,

after hiccupping out some unintelligible words, that self-same reverend

gentleman--the pastor of an admiring flock, and whose sermons were so

refreshing and so savoury,--when _he_,--the individual whom she had

looked upon as the essence of human perfection,--when _he_, we say,

cast his arms around her neck and administered to her somewhat wrinkled

cheeks a hearty smack,--_then_, what did she do? Why--she put up with

the affront--doubtless to save the reputation of the minister;--and,

perhaps with the same charitable desire to avoid the scandal of an

exposure, she permitted him to repeat his caresses as often as he chose

during the half-hour that he remained in her company. She even made

him some tea, which materially tended to sober him; and, when he had

at length taken his departure, she muttered several times to herself,

“Well--after all, this saint of a man is mere flesh and blood like any

other!”

But when Mrs. Rudd’s more pleasurable reflections had ceased,--for

pleasurable they certainly were, both during the reverend gentleman’s

presence and for a short time after the door had closed behind

him,--she remembered that her disagreeable lodgers were, still in

the house, notwithstanding the remonstrances which, according to

his statement to the widow, the pious minister had most eloquently

addressed to them. And that they _were_ still in the dwelling, she

was very soon made to understand;--for the obstreperous behaviour of

those “dreadful men,” to use Mrs. Rudd’s own words, recommenced in

the form of the most hearty peals of laughter--and the clashing of the

fire-irons--and the stamping of feet, as if the two gentlemen were mad.

“They have begun their booze,” said Mrs. Rudd to herself, looking

up in despair at the ceiling, as if she thought the captain and his

friend must inevitably come through upon her devoted head. “But

never mind!” she suddenly exclaimed aloud, as a thought--a very

bright thought struck her: “I will put up with it for this once--and

to-morrow--to-morrow----”

Here Mrs. Rudd stopped short; for she would not even trust the empty

air with the lucid idea which had struck her.

We may however inform our readers that this said idea was nothing more

nor less than to lock out the two gentlemen when they went for their

usual walk on the morrow.

Tranquillized by the excellence of the scheme, Mrs. Rudd refreshed

herself with a small drop of brandy, and then spread her huge Bible

open on the table before her--not to read it, but merely because “it

looked pious-like,” as she thought, if any of her neighbours should

happen to drop in. For Mrs. Rudd delighted in the reputation for

sanctity which she enjoyed amongst her acquaintances in general, and

the frequenters of the reverend gentleman’s chapel in particular.

Let us now return to Mr. Frank Curtis and Captain O’Blunderbuss, who,

as the landlady rightly concluded, were enjoying themselves in their

own peculiar fashion up-stairs.

Having partaken of a cold joint, and the slip-shod girl of the house

having provided them with a jug of hot water, the two gentlemen

commenced the evening’s orgie. The whiskey-punch which they brewed was

of that kind which is libellously alleged to be peculiarly affected

by ladies--namely, “hot, strong, and plenty of it;”--and, under its

influence, they soon manifested their wonted exuberance of spirits.

First, Captain O’Blunderbuss would insist upon giving Frank a lesson

with the broad-sword--the one using the poker, and the other the

shovel;--and every time the gallant officer thrust his friend in the

ribs, a hearty shout of laughter burst from their lips--for they

considered it prime fun.

When they were tired of this amusement, they resumed their

seats--replenished their glasses--and chatted on divers matters

interesting to themselves. Presently Frank started up, and leapt over

a chair in order to show his agility, although he had grown somewhat

stout of late years;--and as he acquitted himself in a clumsy manner,

the captain volunteered to teach him how to do it. But the gallant

officer only tumbled over the chair, causing a tremendous split in his

trousers--an accident at which they nevertheless both laughed more

heartily than ever.

“Be Jasus!” cried the captain, “and it’s the only pair of

unmintionables that I possess! But niver mind: I’ll be afther telling

the gal to take them round to the tailor’s the first thing in the

morning; and so I’ll take my breakfast in bed, Frank. They’ll soon be

sent home again.”

“Let’s see? we’ve got to meet Styles to-morrow at three in the

afternoon,” said Curtis; “and, by Jove! we must make him come down with

the dust.”

“Be the power-rs! and you’re right, my frind!” exclaimed the captain.

“It’s eighteen-pince that’s left in my pocket at this prisint

spaking----”

“And nothing at all in mine,” interrupted Frank, both his hands diving

at the same time down into the depths of the empty conveniences alluded

to. “Deuce take this railway affair! It gets on precious slow. I

remember when I was in Paris two or three-and-twenty years ago, they

were making a new path-way through my friend the Archbishop’s estate at

Fontainbleau; and if his Grace didn’t go and swear at the men all day

long, they never would have got on with it.”

“Be the power-rs! if it’s a thrifle of swearing that would make Misther

Styles push a-head,” said the gallant officer, “I’m the boy to help him

on with that same.”

“You see there’s been what they call a tightness in the Money-Market

lately,” observed Frank: “at least, that’s what Styles told me the

other day----”

“And it’s an infer-r-rnal tightness that’s got hould of _our_

Money-Market, my frind,” interrupted the captain. “Be Jasus! there’s

the potheen bottle empty--and no tick at the public!”

“You’ve got eighteen-pence in your pocket, captain,” suggested Curtis.

“Right, me boy!”--and he rang the bell furiously.

The slip-shod girl answered the summons, and was forthwith despatched

for a supply of whiskey at the wine-vaults which the lodgers honoured

with their custom.

“Now we’re altogether aground,” said Curtis, after a pause which had

followed the departure of the servant. “But we’ve every thing necessary

in the house for to-morrow morning’s breakfast, except the milk----”

“And bar-r-ring my breeches, ye spalpeen!” cried the captain. “They

must be immediately menthed, any how.”

“Oh! the tailor won’t think of asking for the money when he brings

them home,” said Curtis: then, beholding the comical expression of

his friend’s countenance, which was elongated with sore misgivings

respecting the amount of confidence the snip might choose to put in his

honour, Frank burst out into a tremendous fit of laughter.

“Arrah! and be Jasus! and it’s all mighty fine for you, Misther Curtis,

to make a damned fool of yourself in that fashion,” exclaimed Captain

O’Blunderbuss, becoming as red as a turkey-cock: “but I can assure ye

that it’s no joking matther for me to contimplate the prospict of lying

in bed for a week or two till I get my breeches back again. And now, if

you’re not afther houlding your tongue, Frank, I’ll tip ye a small rap

on the head with the poker--by the howly poker-r, I will!”

“Don’t get into a rage, captain,” said Curtis, putting a bridle upon

his mirth in consequence of the threat just held out--a threat which he

knew his amiable friend was perfectly capable of putting into force. “I

will go out the first thing in the morning and see Styles--and I have

no doubt he will give me some money. I shall be back again by the time

the tailor comes home with--with----”

“The unmintionables!” vociferated the captain, his wrath reviving as

he saw that his friend was once more on the point of giving vent to

a hearty cachinnation. “But here’s the gal coming up stairs with the

potheen; and so we’ll be afther enjoying ourselves for the prisint, and

think of the tightness of the Money-Mar-r-rket in the morning.”

“Well, what the deuce has made you so long?” demanded Frank Curtis, as

the slip-shod domestic entered the room.

“Long, sir!” echoed the girl, as if in surprise. “Lor, sir--I ain’t

been a minit!”

“Not a minute!” cried Frank, who always bullied servants--when they

weren’t footmen who could knock him down for his impudence: “I tell

you, you’ve been more than a quarter of an hour.”

“Well, sir--and if so be I have,” said the girl, suddenly recollecting

something which had occurred to hinder her on her errand, “it was

because as I went out of the street-door a man come up and asked me if

so be as Mr. Smith lived here. ‘_No_,’ says I: ‘_he don’t.’--‘Well,

then_,’ says the man, ‘_Mr. Brown does.’--‘No, he don’t, though_,’ I

says, says I; ‘_nor yet Mr. Jones, nor Mr. Noakes neether.’--‘Well, who

does live here, then?_’ says the man; and as I thought it would teach

him not to be so precious knowing another time, I out and told him slap

as how two gentlemen lived here as was named Blunderbuss--leastways,

O’Blunderbuss, and Curtis.”

“The devil you did!” ejaculated the two lodgers as it were in the same

breath, and exchanging significant glances which expressed the same

apprehension.

“To be sure I did, sir,” responded the girl, not perceiving the alarm

which she had created in the minds of the gentlemen, but rather

attributing their excited ejaculations to an approval of her conduct:

“for I thinks to myself, thinks I, ‘_Now, my fine feller, you’ll

believe that there’s no Smiths or Browns here; and you won’t be quite

so positive another time._’”

“Well--and what did the man say?” demanded Frank Curtis, darting

another uneasy glance at his friend.

“He only said ‘_Oh!_’ and went away,” returned the girl; “and that’s

what kept me a little in going----”

“What sort of a looking fellow was he?” asked Curtis.

“He warn’t a gentleman, sir--and he smelt horrible of drink,” said the

domestic.

“But what should you take him for?” demanded Frank, impatiently.

“A thief, sir,” was the ingenuous response.

“Be Jasus! and thin it’s a shiriff’s----” ejaculated Captain

O’Blunderbuss, starting in his chair: but, instantly stopping short

ere he completed the sentence, he added in a few moments and in a less

excited tone, “You may go down stairs, my dear; and if any one comes

and asks for Misther Frank Cur-r-tis or Captain O’Bluntherbuss, ye must

deny us, mind--or I’ll be afther skinning ye alive!”

“Lor, sir!” cried the girl; and, horrified by the dreadful threat, she

hastened from the room as if the individual who had uttered the menace

were preparing to carry it into execution.

For some few minutes after she had taken her departure, Captain

O’Blunderbuss and Mr. Curtis sate eyeing each other in silence,--the

same idea evidently occupying both--and both fearful to express it; as

if to give utterance to the thought were positively to meet the dreaded

misfortune half-way.

“Well,” exclaimed Curtis, at length, “and what do you think of that?”

“Be Jasus! and it’s what do _you_ think of it?” cried the captain.

“For my part I think it’s Rumrigg and Kaysay the lawyers, who’ve found

out where we are, and mean to take us on that cursed cognovit we gave

them last Christmas for the discounter’s affair,” said Mr. Curtis,

who, having now fully expressed his fears, no longer hesitated to look

particularly blank upon the matter.

“Faith! and that same’s my opinion also,” exclaimed the gallant

officer; then, grasping the poker very tight in his hand, he said,

“But if the thunthering villains of shiriff’s-officers crape into this

house, it’s myself that’ll sind ’em out again with a flay in their ear.

So don’t make yourself unhappy at all, at all, my frind; but let’s

dhrink bad luck to the bastes of the airth!”

“With all my heart,” cried Frank, brewing for himself a strong glass of

toddy. “The only thing is----”

“Is what?” demanded the captain, suddenly desisting from his occupation

of mixing a tumbler of grog for himself, and fixing his eyes sternly

upon his friend.

“The breeches,” was the laconic answer.

“Ah! now--and can’t ye be asy about those same unmintionables?” cried

the gallant officer. “I suspicted it was afther them ye was harping

again and again. It’ll become a sore subject in time, Frank. So

dhrink--and bad luck to the inexprissibles.”

And the two gentlemen did drink, until the bottle was empty, when

they retired to rest--the captain having previously informed the

servant-girl that he should leave his trousers outside his chamber

door, and that she must take them round to the tailor the very first

thing in the morning, with instructions for him to mend and return them

as speedily as possible.