Part 2

Before I come to the spy No. 2, Miss G——’s arrival, I must tell you of three other personages in this infamous _dramatis personæ_. Soon after my arrival at Llangollen, a man calling himself “Mr. LEIGHTON,” and purporting to be a theatrical manager, wrote to me for permission to dramatise my novel of ——, which I gave him; but this correspondence extended over so many months without anything being done, his letters being dated Theatres Royal, Southampton, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, in short, every provincial theatre in the kingdom, that I, of course, began to see this was some fresh villainy of Sir ——, who, after cutting the ground from under me in every unimaginably mean way, by preventing my earning the bread he will not give me, no doubt thought it a rare jest to fool me into the supposition that one of my books, which is a ready made drama, was going to be dramatised. But one has only to look at his hideous face, and that of that other brute, DICKENS, to see that _every_ bad passion has left the impress of its cloven hoof upon their fiendish lineaments. However, as HAYDON the painter told old MELBOURNE years ago, “Any scamp who trades in politics is considered a fit companion for Lords,” and my Lord DERBY seems to have a _foible_ for most unprincipled and disreputable scamps, and such adventurers as D—— and Sir —— are admirably calculated for ‘Nyanziang’ at our exceptionally stupid and inane Court, before our Royal BETTY FOY, “the idiot mother of an idiot boy.”

But to return to Llangollen. I luckily kept all the _soi-disant_ Mr. LEIGHTON’S letters, and the Llangollen post office was kept by a druggist of the name of G—— D——, while _next_ to his shop was a gin shop kept by a _very_ low person of the name of J——, who had formerly had something to do with minor theatres and had narrowly escaped transportation for some of his malpractices. He and this D—— were great cronies, and a private door in a passage of J——’s gin-shop _opened into the post office department of D——’s shop_. Bear all this in mind. This J—— was then living with the maid of a woman with whom he had formerly intrigued, and whose whole family he had ruined. Well, as soon as I got old P——’s letter of warning, I put all the people of the ‘Hand Hotel’ on their guard, and as it was then the depth of winter, no tourists came to Llangollen, and I told them to be _sure_ and let me know if anyone whose name began with a G came to stay there. About ten days after this, BRELLISFORD, the waitress, came to me, and said an old woman looking like a housekeeper had just arrived from the station to take apartments for “her young lady,” a Miss G——, who had just lost her mother, and who intended to spend some time at Llangollen. BRELLISFORD, who had been by me put in possession of old P——’s letter, answered her sharply that it was very strange that a young lady who had lost her mother had no friends to go to, but should come to such a desolate out-of-the-way place, to which the old woman made no reply. I then told BRELLISFORD to let me see (unseen) this old woman, and to be _sure_ and let me know when the _young lady_ arrived. Soon after B—— came up in haste to say the old woman was going to the Post, and that I could see her from the window. I ran to it, and who should I see but old TATE, Sir L——’s housekeeper!!! The young _lady_ did not arrive till two nights after; a most hideous vulgar-looking creature, past 40, with a fiery red face. The morning after her arrival, old TATE left in haste for London, telling Mrs. P——, the woman of the Inn, that she had a large dinner to attend to. For six mortal days Miss G—— was unable to fire her first shot, for even old P——’s old King Charles “Tiney,” who had been re-christened “Prince” for the new campaign, had only succeeded in getting a snap from my Blenheim Tiger on the stairs, unaccompanied by his mistress. For I was waiting for the enemy’s first move before I opened my batteries. It appears that the very first day at dinner, so well acquainted was she with the _carte du pays_ from her predecessors, that she accosted the waitress by her somewhat uncommon name of “BRELLISFORD,” asking her to carve a chicken. “Pray,” said the latter, “how did you know my name?” Miss G—— coloured and stammered and said she’d heard her called so. “That you havn’t since you’ve been in this house, for all the servants call me SARAH.” On the seventh day, instead of resting from her labours, the amiable G—— could hold out no longer, and _apropos de bottes_ asked BRELLISFORD at dinner “If I never went out?” “Seldom in the winter,” was the reply. “Dear me,” said Grogblossom, returning to the charge, “I wish Lady —— would take a drive with me.” Though of course the vulgar wretch, _a la_ DICKENS, said “ride.”—“Not very likely,” said B., “after that _other_ (emphasising the word) vulgar old Spy of that bad man, Sir —— ——, Mrs. P——, playing up the games she did here, Lady —— is not likely to let any more, _no one knows who_, force themselves upon her.” “Spies,” re-echoed Grogblossom, “dear me, what can he have to spy her about. Every one knows what a profligate bad man he is; but at all events, I am not in a sphere of life to know Sir —— —— as an acquaintance, and I’m far too respectable to do his dirty work.” “Then,” said BRELLISFORD, firing up as she snatched the last dish off the table, “if you are not in a _spear_ of life to know Sir ——, who is just fit for the likes of you, how dare you presume to ask, or to think, that her ladyship would go out with you?” and slamming to the door, with an excellent imitation of thunder, she hurried down the passage, and came to my room to report “that Miss GET-NOTHING’S,” as she always called her, impudence, and tell me the whole conversation. Whereupon, I instantly wrote a short note saying that if Miss G—— did not take herself off _instantly_ to her infamous employer, I would have her forcibly ejected. This note I took _myself_, and, opening the door, flung it _without going in_, on the round table, in the middle of the room. A _full_ quarter-of-an-hour after she got up a series of screams, doing duty for hysterics, and rang the bell violently for Mrs. P——, telling her that I had insulted her (G——) in the most violent and unprovoked manner, and that I must be _mad_ (_c’etait la sa consigne_). Old P—— came to me in great consternation, saying, “I should not have taken the law into my own hands.” “You never mind that,” said I, “but go back and tell her that if she does not leave this to-morrow morning, I’ll find a way of making her; and if she feels herself aggrieved, and don’t know what to do, I’ll tell her—namely, if she is _not_ a Spy of that Cowardly Ruffian, Sir —— ——’s, sent to finish the job old P—— begun, let her instantly go to her lawyer, and instruct him to bring an action against me for defamation.” Mrs. P—— returned in a very short time to say that Miss G—— had said very _humbly_ she _would_ go as soon as she possibly could; but she had come in such a hurry she had had to buy a flannel petticoat!!! on her arrival (_idem_ old P——’s _darter_, to whom the same romantic incident of travel had happened), and that she must write for _money_ (ditto old P——’s “darter” again), having none, and she could not possibly get an answer before the day after to-morrow.

[Illustration: EDWARD, LORD LYTTON.]

Now Sir —— was at that time flaring up at Leeds, lecturing at Mechanics’ Institutes upon “The Holiness of Truth” to the “snobs,” and the Sacredness of Probity!! till, as a lady who wrote me word of it said, she wondered the earth did not open and swallow the blasphemous monster. I told SARAH BRELLISFORD to be sure and bring me any letter or letters that came to Miss G—— on the morning she expected the _indispensable_ remittance, _not_ to open or destroy them, or intercept them, as her friend Sir —— would have done; but merely to see the superscription, that is, the handwriting of the remittance letter. Well, it came, with Sir ——’s unmistakable mean scrawl, and _crest_ on the seal, and the Leeds postmark, _and no mistake_, and two hours after Miss G—— was bundled off. She was scarcely gone when I got letters from London imploring me to be on my guard, as these G——’s lived at Brighton, and the one sent to Llangollen _had a carriage always ready on the road, in order, if I could be found out walking, to kidnap me, and carry me off to a Madhouse_, as Sir —— was giving out all over London, _via_ a Mr. ROBERT BELL, one of the DICKENS’S literary clique, that I was _quite mad_, and also by his infamous _ame damnée_, the infamous attorney, L——. Now this L——, you must know, Sir —— himself told me years ago, “_intrigued with his own sister, to save the expense of a mistress!_” A fitting tool, truly, for so loathsome a ruffian as the bran new baronet! And the attorney boasts with his sardonic grin, “Oh! Sir —— ——, he _must_ do whatever I please.” After I had put Miss G—— to flight, I wrote to Lady HOTHAM and several others at Brighton, to find out who and what those G——’s were, and telling them of the Madhouse Conspiracy _en train_. To which I got back an ocean of English twaddle and conventional cant, telling me not to talk of spies and madhouse conspiracies in the 19th century, but to remember that I lived in a _free_ country (very _free_, for any villainy to be practised with impunity, where there is money to pay for it, a position to cover it, or Lords PALMERSTONS, DERBYS, LYNDHURSTS, or Chief Justice COCKBURNS, who so long as they do the _public_ humbug well in verbal sounding brass, can and do employ the most infamous tools to do their _private_ dirty work, and of course are in duty bound to _screen_ and protect the said tools in all their own little personal crimes and enormities) and above all, I was told to remember that however bad Sir —— might be, he knew the laws of his country, and _couldn’t_ (couldn’t he, when it is done every day!) incarcerate me without a public (oh, dear) and full enquiry about all my sayings, and doings, and habits, which would be the very _best_ thing that could happen to me, as he had so many years ground me down to poverty, as to effectually make me a dead letter; so that all the lies he so indefatigably disseminated about me went by default. However, as one evening Lady HOTHAM was repeating at dinner the sapient advice that she had written to me to her Brighton Doctor, a Dr. T——, who lives in Regency-square there, and another gentleman, an acquaintance of mine, Dr. T—— said, “G——, G——! Stop; I _do_ know some people who know two Miss G——s. My wife and I are going to a party there to-morrow night, and I’ll try and find out what I can about those Miss G——s.” “Do,” said the other gentleman, “and as I must return to town to-morrow, be so good as to write and let me know what you do find out, that I may tell Lady ——, as I don’t at all agree with Lady HOTHAM about the madhouse conspiracy being a chimera of hers.” Accordingly, the day after the party, this gentleman received the following letter from Dr. T——, which he sent me, and which I have got. It began: “Dear Sir,—I went to the party I told you of last night, and sure enough who should be there but a Miss G——, who was boasting that Sir E—— L—— was a great friend of theirs, and that her _sister_ had just returned from Llangollen, where she had seen that horrid wife of his (a lie, for she had _not_ seen me), who was quite mad, but she was happy to say also, so ill, that she could not live a week. Poor Lady L——, it is really too hard,” Dr. T—— goes on to say—but I need not trouble you with the rest of the letter.

The summer after this I got out of the hotel into a lodging, small, but very nicely furnished, of which I took the whole _except_ the parlours, which, as the woman only asked 25 shillings a week for them, I told her on _no_ account to let them to any one, but if she had an offer to do so I would pay her for them rather than have any other lodger in the house, after all I had suffered. Nothing could exceed the attention and _prevoyante_ civility of these people. But when I had been there about three weeks, to my great horror and indignation, in the teeth of her promise, she informed me that she had let the parlour to a lady and gentleman, as they had given her two guineas a week for them; this alarmed me more, whereupon this silly woman, to reassure me, told me she was a lady of the highest connections, a Mrs. B——, as she herself had told her she was related to Lord This and the Marquis of That. I said, my good Mrs. P——, depend upon it by her giving you more than you asked for your rooms, and bragging about her great relations, she is not a gentlewoman, but some improper person or other. The next morning the plot began to thicken, and up came a great disgusting dish of _raw_ trout with Mr. B——’s compliments, as he had been out fishing, though Mrs. P—— let out that he had bought them of Mrs. J—— at the gin-shop. I returned them saying I was much obliged, but I never ate river fish. Through the windows I had the felicity of seeing Mr. and Mrs. B——. He looked a something between a retired undertaker and a methodist parson in a rusty black coat and a dirty white cravat and shoes and stockings of a morning; and she was a perfect hybrid (with long black ringlets, a staring silk Stuart plaid dress, and very short petticoats) between a ballet girl at a fifth-rate theatre and a Regent’s-street social evil, who did _not_ attend the midnight meetings. I have since heard from indisputable authority that these vulgar wretches are always with Sir —— at K—— and Ventnor, and elsewhere, that he took to intriguing with that raw-boned frau, Madame ERNST, and dedicating his Balderdashiana in ‘Blackwood’ to her paralysed gorilla of a husband, ERNST the fiddler, whose society must be delightful to a man who is as deaf as a post, and who, before he was so, in point of music did not know “BOB and JOAN” from “GOD save the QUEEN,” and who does not know _one word_ of German. For of all his literary charlataneries, his pretended translation of —— —— was the most iniquitous, as at them it was he slaved his poor young daughter to death. His French is execrable and ridiculous enough; still he can read and understand it, though he does call naïveté _navetty_!! which is almost as marvellous a travesty as that other woful attempt at an admirable CRICHTON and an omniscient genius(?), Mr. W—— R——, who calls VOLTAIRE—VOLL-TAIRE, so as to rhyme with NOLL; and who seems strongly to confound notoriety with fame, and therefore went to the trouble and expense of going to Africa to so _usefully_ enlighten the world by informing it that when he attempted to kiss the African young ladies, they ran away! Why—he need not have gone so far to make that discovery, as “my dear husband to a toad-stool” (which is a fair bet, the venemous reptile against the poisonous fungus), had he made the experiment in England every young lady, to a crinoline, would have done the same. This singularly antipathique young gentleman who, after favouring me with a brisk correspondence which I knew must have some covert meaning, as an Englishman _never_ does anything without a sordid or selfish motive, last June did me the honour of inflicting upon me a three days’ visit, ostensibly _en route_ to Tenby to see his parents, of whom he spoke in a depreciating contemptuous manner that quite disgusted me, as if, poor silly people, they were quite below par, and unworthy of having such a son—I beg pardon, such a genius(?) of a son. With true English good breeding he hunted me up the day before I could possibly receive him, but however stupid he might have been to me, I daresay it was agreeable enough to him; as I understand he spent his nights down in the bar, which I should think was a much more congenial place to him than a drawing-room. When he went, as I thought, to Tenby, he wrote me word he had gone back to Oxfordshire, “and his parents would keep,” as upon getting to Reading he found he had no money! This was so very like all the Sir ——’s innumerable myrmidons, that it gave me as I wrote a cold shudder; as I could not but solve the mystery of his correspondence and invasion by setting him down as one of Sir ——’s spies, in which idea I am confirmed by his after getting or not getting what he wanted, just like a true English boor, and with his insane literary mania and evident absence of principle, I have no doubt he would be glad to ingratiate himself with that infamous man on _any_ terms. A friend of mine suggested to me as a solution of his visit, that perhaps he had heard that I was such a fool, as the dear, selfish English say, in helping others, when I so sorely needed help myself, that he might have wanted to borrow money; but though I may be able to skin myself in £20 or £30, he surely could not suppose that any one condemned to the miserable and disinherited life I lead could have any hundreds to lend him towards ministering to his overweening and senseless vanity? I have not seen his book, feeling no interest in it after seeing him; but I was silly enough two or three years ago to give him a volume of Essays that I had written in great haste, thinking he might sell them for a few pounds; and I should not be the least surprised if every thought in them (originality certainly not being his forte) were, _a la_ Sir L——, made to do duty as his reflections in “Savage Africa.” The kissing episode I have quoted was sent me by a lady in a newspaper extract to make me laugh, which it did most heartily. Now to return to the dear B——, whom I understand with the Swiss drab of a governess whom Sir —— seduced long ago at Malvern, and whom recently in that pretty —— trial about the crystal ball he improvised as his cook! thinking, no doubt, that as the devil sends cooks and also concubines, it was all the same thing, and cook sounded better in a Court of Justice. So these B——s and the Swiss Traviata form the _corps d’armee_ of his spirit-rapping establishment, which is this great man’s mode of combining spirit and matter: the vice being the _real_, and his genius the _ideal_, or _non est_.

Well, Mr. B——, I suppose by way of doing his spiriting gently, that is, not disturbing the spirits (except those in the brandy bottle, to which he gave no quarter, but always full measure), used always to take off those pretty dust undertaker’s _shoes_ of his to steal up and down stairs, which I suppose meant that if I was going out of the drawing-room I might not be deterred from doing so by hearing a step upon the stairs.

A few evenings after I had returned the trout caught in the lake of _Gin_-eva down at J——’s, the evening being very sultry, I was obliged to leave my drawing-room door slightly ajar, when, to my horror, who should come tripping in with a basket of strawberries but the social amateur evil, dressed, or rather undressed, to a pitch that would have alarmed even an art student. She made me a sort of theatrical speech in which she introduced herself and her strawberries. I never eat strawberries any more than trout; and in the absence of Wenham-lake ice, my reception of her must have been most refreshing, or rather refrigerating. Nothing daunted, this intensely vulgar piece of effrontery (who, I understand, is a natural daughter of that horrid old scamp, Lord LOWTHER: hence her high connexions) spread her furbelows, and, uninvited, seated herself; and seeing the shoeless undertaker creeping upstairs, she had the crowning impertinence to call him in, and introduce him to me, I visibly petrifying the while, and not replying to a single thing he said; till the he B——, by way of saying something pleasant, remarked that DICKENS was a wonderful man. “A wonderful brute and humbug he certainly is,” said I. The she B—— then began, with a volubility that reminded one of one of CHARLES MATTHEWS’S patter songs, to recount to me a spirit-rapping story of an umbrella that had been left in a corner, and suddenly took it in its head—its ivory dog’s head at the end of the handle—to turn round, walk across the room, and walk downstairs; whereupon I said in an insinuating voice: “_Will_ you both have the goodness to show me how it went downstairs?” At which Mr. B—— indulged in a loud guffaw, and gently and elegantly knocking his two thumbnails together, as if he had been trying vivisection on a flea, said, “Not bad; not bad.” I then rose, and very stiffly announced that I had drank tea, was going to bed, and could not offer them any wine and water, as I never drank wine; whereupon this “charming woman,” turning briskly to the undertaker, said, “B——, run down, and bring up the wine and spirits.” I said, “Not here, pray,” and darting into my bedroom, locked the door.