The Three Clerks by Anthony Trollope

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'Well, Undy, I can let you have L250, and that is every shilling
I have at my banker's.'

'They would not let you overdraw a few hundreds?' suggested
Undy.

'I certainly shall not try them,' said Alaric.

'You are so full of scruple, so green, so young,' said Undy,
almost in an enthusiasm of remonstrance. 'What can be the harm of
trying them?'

'My credit.'

'Fal lal. What's the meaning of credit? How are you to know
whether you have got any credit if you don't try? Come, I'll tell
you how you can do it. Old Cuttwater would lend it you for the
asking.'

To this proposition Alaric at first turned a deaf ear; but by
degrees he allowed Undy to talk him over. Undy showed him that if
he lost the Tillietudlem burghs on this occasion it would be
useless for him to attempt to stand for them again. In such case,
he would have no alternative at the next general election but to
stand for the borough of Strathbogy in Aberdeenshire; whereas, if
he could secure Tillietudlem as a seat for himself, all the
Gaberlunzie interest in the borough of Strathbogy, which was
supposed to be by no means small, should be transferred to Alaric
himself. Indeed, Sandie Scott, the eldest hope of the Gaberlunzie
family, would, in such case, himself propose Alaric to the
electors. Ca'stalk Cottage, in which the Hon. Sandie lived, and
which was on the outskirts of the Gaberlunzie property, was
absolutely within the boundary of the borough.

Overcome by these and other arguments, Alaric at last consented
to ask from Captain Cuttwater the loan of L700. That sum Undy had
agreed to accept as a sufficient contribution to that desirable
public object, the re-seating himself for the Tillietudlem
borough, and as Alaric on reflection thought that it would be
uncomfortable to be left penniless himself, and as it was just as
likely that Uncle Bat would lend him L700 as L500, he determined
to ask for a loan of the entire sum. He accordingly did so, and
the letter, as we have seen, reached the captain while Harry and
Charley were at Surbiton Cottage. The old gentleman was anything
but pleased. In the first place he liked his money, though not
with any overweening affection; in the next place, he had done a
great deal for Alaric, and did not like being asked to do more;
and lastly, he feared that there must be some evil cause for the
necessity of such a loan so soon after Alaric's marriage.

Alaric in making his application had not done so actually without
making any explanation on the subject. He wrote a long letter,
worded very cleverly, which only served to mystify the captain,
as Alaric had intended that it should do. Captain Cuttwater was
most anxious that Alaric, whom he looked on as his adopted son,
should rise in the world; he would have been delighted to think
that he might possibly live to see him in Parliament; would
probably have made considerable pecuniary sacrifice for such an
object. With the design, therefore, of softening Captain
Cuttwater's heart, Alaric in his letter had spoken about great
changes that were coming, of the necessity that there was of his
stirring himself, of the great pecuniary results to be expected
from a small present expenditure; and ended by declaring that the
money was to be used in forwarding the election of his friend
Scott for the Tillietudlem district burghs.

Now, the fact was, that Uncle Bat, though he cared a great deal
for Alaric, did not care a rope's end for Undy Scott, and could
enjoy his rum-punch just as keenly if Mr. Scott was in obscurity
as he could possibly hope to do even if that gentleman should be
promoted to be a Lord of the Treasury. He was not at all pleased
to think that his hard-earned moidores should run down the
gullies of the Tillietudlem boroughs in the shape of muddy ale or
vitriolic whisky; and yet this was the first request that Alaric
had ever made to him, and he did not like to refuse Alaric's
first request. So he came up to town himself on the following
morning with Harry and Charley, determined to reconcile all these
difficulties by the light of his own wisdom.

In the evening he returned to Surbiton Cottage, having been into
the city, sold out stock for L700, and handed over the money to
Alaric Tudor.

On the following morning Undy Scott set out for Scotland,
properly freighted, Mr. Whip Vigil having in due course moved for
a new writ for the Tillietudlem borough in the place of Mr.
M'Buffer, who had accepted the situation of Steward of the
Chiltern Hundreds.

CHAPTER XXV

CHISWICK GARDENS

The following Thursday was as fine as a Chiswick flower-show-day
ought to be, and so very seldom is. The party who had agreed to
congregate there--the party, that is, whom we are to meet--was
very select. Linda and Katie had come up to spend a few days with
their sister. Mrs. Val, Clementina, Gertrude, and Linda were to
go in a carriage, for which Alaric was destined to pay, and which
Mrs. Val had hired, having selected it regardless of expense, as
one which, by its decent exterior and polished outward graces,
conferred on its temporary occupiers an agreeable appearance of
proprietorship. The two Miss Neverbends, sisters of Fidus, were
also to be with them, and they with Katie followed humbly, as
became their station, in a cab, which was not only hired, but
which very vulgarly told the fact to all the world.

Slight as had been the intimacy between Fidus Neverbend and
Alaric at Tavistock, nevertheless a sort of friendship had since
grown up between them. Alaric had ascertained that Fidus might in
a certain degree be useful to him, that the good word of the
Aristides of the Works and Buildings might be serviceable, and
that, in short, Neverbend was worth cultivating. Neverbend, on
the other hand, when he perceived that Tudor was likely to become
a Civil Service hero, a man to be named with glowing eulogy at
all the Government Boards in London, felt unconsciously a desire
to pay him some of that reverence which a mortal always feels for
a god. And thus there was formed between them a sort of alliance,
which included also the ladies of the family.

Not that Mrs. Val, or even Mrs. A. Tudor, encountered Lactimel
and Ugolina Neverbend on equal terms. There is a distressing
habitual humility in many unmarried ladies of an uncertain age,
which at the first blush tells the tale against them which they
are so painfully anxious to leave untold. In order to maintain
their places but yet a little longer in that delicious world of
love, sighs, and dancing partners, from which it must be so hard
for a maiden, with all her youthful tastes about her, to tear
herself for ever away, they smile and say pretty things, put up
with the caprices of married women, and play second fiddle,
though the doing so in no whit assists them in their task. Nay,
the doing so does but stamp them the more plainly with that
horrid name from which they would so fain escape. Their plea is
for mercy--'Have pity on me, have pity on me; put up with me but
for one other short twelve months; and then, if then I shall
still have failed, I will be content to vanish from the world for
ever.' When did such plea for pity from one woman ever find real
entrance into the heart of another?

On such terms, however, the Misses Neverbend were content to
follow Mrs. Val to the Chiswick flower-show, and to feed on the
crumbs which might chance to fall from the rich table of Miss
Golightly; to partake of broken meat in the shape of cast-off
adorers, and regale themselves with lukewarm civility from the
outsiders in the throng which followed that adorable heiress.

And yet the Misses Neverbend were quite as estimable as the
divine Clementina, and had once been, perhaps, as attractive as
she is now. They had never waltzed, it is true, as Miss Golightly
waltzes. It may be doubted, indeed, whether any lady ever did. In
the pursuit of that amusement Ugolina was apt to be stiff and
ungainly, and to turn herself, or allow herself to be turned, as
though she were made of wood; she was somewhat flat in her
figure, looking as though she had been uncomfortably pressed into
an unbecoming thinness of substance, and a corresponding breadth
of surface, and this conformation did not assist her in acquiring
a graceful flowing style of motion. The elder sister, Lactimel,
was of a different form, but yet hardly more fit to shine in the
mazes of the dance than her sister. She had her charms,
nevertheless, which consisted of a somewhat stumpy dumpy
comeliness. She was altogether short in stature, and very short
below the knee. She had fair hair and a fair skin, small bones
and copious soft flesh. She had a trick of sighing gently in the
evolutions of the waltz, which young men attributed to her
softness of heart, and old ladies to her shortness of breath.
They both loved dancing dearly, and were content to enjoy it
whenever the chance might be given to them by the aid of Miss
Golightly's crumbs.

The two sisters were as unlike in their inward lights as in their
outward appearance. Lactimel walked ever on the earth, but
Ugolina never deserted the clouds. Lactimel talked prose and
professed to read it; Ugolina read poetry and professed to write
it. Lactimel was utilitarian. _Cui bono_?--though probably
in less classic phrase--was the question she asked as to
everything. Ugolina was transcendental, and denied that there
could be real good in anything. Lactimel would have clothed
and fed the hungry and naked, so that all mankind might be
comfortable. Ugolina would have brought mankind back to their
original nakedness, and have taught them to feed on the grasses
of the field, so that the claims of the body, which so vitally
oppose those of the mind, might remain unheeded and despised.
They were both a little nebulous in their doctrines, and apt to
be somewhat unintelligible in their discourse, when indulged in
the delights of unrestrained conversation. Lactimel had a theory
that every poor brother might eat of the fat and drink of the
sweet, might lie softly, and wear fine linen, if only some body
or bodies could be induced to do their duties; and Ugolina was
equally strong in a belief that if the mind were properly looked
to, all appreciation of human ill would cease. But they delighted
in generalizing rather than in detailed propositions; and had not
probably, even in their own minds, realized any exact idea as to
the means by which the results they desired were to be brought
about.

They toadied Mrs. Val--poor young women, how little should they
be blamed for this fault, which came so naturally to them in
their forlorn position!--they toadied Mrs. Val, and therefore
Mrs. Val bore with them; they bored Gertrude, and Gertrude, for
her husband's sake, bore with them also; they were confidential
with Clementina, and Clementina, of course, snubbed them. They
called Clementina 'the sweetest creature.' Lactimel declared that
she was born to grace the position of a wife and mother, and
Ugolina swore that her face was perfect poetry. Whereupon
Clementina laughed aloud, and elegantly made a grimace with her
nose and mouth, as she turned the 'perfect poetry' to her mother.
Such were the ladies of the party who went to the Chiswick
flower-show, and who afterwards were to figure at Mrs. Val's
little evening 'the dansant,' at which nobody was to be admitted
who was not nice.

They were met at the gate of the Gardens by a party of young men,
of whom Victoire Jaquetanape was foremost. Alaric and Charley
were to come down there when their office work was done. Undy was
by this time on his road to Tillietudlem; and Captain Val was
playing billiards at his club. The latter had given a promise
that he would make his appearance--a promise, however, which no
one expected, or wished him to keep.

The happy Victoire was dressed up to his eyes. That, perhaps, is
not saying much, for he was only a few feet high; but what he
wanted in quantity he fully made up in quality. He was a well-
made, shining, jaunty little Frenchman, who seemed to be
perfectly at ease with himself and all the world. He had the
smallest little pair of moustaches imaginable, the smallest
little imperial, the smallest possible pair of boots, and the
smallest possible pair of gloves. Nothing on earth could be
nicer, or sweeter, or finer, than he was. But he did not carry
his finery like a hog in armour, as an Englishman so often does
when an Englishman stoops to be fine. It sat as naturally on
Victoire as though he had been born in it. He jumped about in his
best patent leather boots, apparently quite heedless whether he
spoilt them or not; and when he picked up Miss Golightly's
parasol from the gravel, he seemed to suffer no anxiety about his
gloves.

He handed out the ladies one after another, as though his life
had been passed in handing out ladies, as, indeed, it probably
had--in handing them out and handing them in; and when Mrs. Val's
'private' carriage passed on, he was just as courteous to the
Misses Neverbend and Katie in their cab, as he had been to the
greater ladies who had descended from the more ambitious vehicle.
As Katie said afterwards to Linda, when she found the free use of
her voice in their own bedroom, 'he was a darling little duck of
a man, only he smelt so strongly of tobacco.'

But when they were once in the garden, Victoire had no time for
anyone but Mrs. Val and Clementina. He had done his duty by the
Misses Neverbend and those other two insipid young English girls,
and now he had his own affairs to look after. He also knew that
Miss Golightly had L20,000 of her own!

He was one of those butterfly beings who seem to have been
created that they may flutter about from flower to flower in the
summer hours of such gala times as those now going on at
Chiswick, just as other butterflies do. What the butterflies were
last winter, or what will become of them next winter, no one but
the naturalist thinks of inquiring. How they may feed themselves
on flower-juice, or on insects small enough to be their prey, is
matter of no moment to the general world. It is sufficient that
they flit about in the sunbeams, and add bright glancing spangles
to the beauty of the summer day.

And so it was with Victoire Jaquetanape. He did no work. He made
no honey. He appeared to no one in the more serious moments of
life. He was the reverse of Shylock; he would neither buy with
you nor sell with you, but he would eat with you and drink with
you; as for praying, he did little of that either with or without
company. He was clothed in purple and fine linen, as butterflies
should be clothed, and fared sumptuously everyday; but whence
came his gay colours, or why people fed him with pate and
champagne, nobody knew and nobody asked.

Like most Frenchmen of his class, he never talked about himself.
He understood life, and the art of pleasing, and the necessity
that he should please, too well to do so. All that his companions
knew of him was that he came from France, and that when the
gloomy months came on in England, the months so unfitted for a
French butterfly, he packed up his azure wings and sought some
more genial climate, certain to return and be seen again when the
world of London became habitable.

If he had means of living no one knew it; if he was in debt no
one ever heard of it; if he had a care in the world he concealed
it. He abounded in acquaintances who were always glad to see him,
and would have regarded it as quite de trop to have a friend.
Nevertheless time was flying on with him as with others; and,
butterfly as he was, the idea of Miss Golightly's L20,000 struck
him with delightful amazement--500,000 francs! 500,000 francs!
and so he resolved to dance his very best, warm as the weather
undoubtedly was at the present moment.

'Ah, he was charmed to see madame and mademoiselle look so
charmingly,' he said, walking between mother and daughter, but
paying apparently much the greater share of attention to the
elder lady. In this respect we Englishmen might certainly learn
much from the manners of our dear allies. We know well enough how
to behave ourselves to our fair young countrywomen; we can be
civil enough to young women--nature teaches us that; but it is so
seldom that we are sufficiently complaisant to be civil to old
women. And yet that, after all, is the soul of gallantry. It is
to the sex that we profess to do homage. Our theory is, that
feminine weakness shall receive from man's strength humble and
respectful service. But where is the chivalry, where the
gallantry, if we only do service in expectation of receiving such
guerdon as rosy cheeks and laughing eyes can bestow?

It may be said that Victoire had an object in being civil to Mrs.
Val. But the truth is, all French Victoires are courteous to old
ladies. An Englishman may probably be as forward as a Frenchman
in rushing into a flaming building to save an old woman's life;
but then it so rarely happens that occasion offers itself for
gallantry such as that. A man, however, may with ease be civil to
a dozen old women in one day.

And so they went on, walking through parterres and glass-houses,
talking of theatres, balls, dinner-parties, picnics, concerts,
operas, of ladies married and single, of single gentlemen who
should be married, and of married gentlemen who should be single,
of everything, indeed, except the flowers, of which neither
Victoire nor his companions took the slightest notice.

'And madame really has a dance to-night in her own house?'

'O yes,' said Mrs. Val; 'that is, just a few quadrilles and
waltzes for Clementina. I really hardly know whether the people
will take the carpet up or no.' The people, consisting of the
cook and housemaid--for the page had, of course, come with the
carriage--were at this moment hard at work wrenching up the
nails, as Mrs. Val was very well aware.

'It will be delightful, charming,' said Victoire.

'Just a few people of our own set, you know,' said Mrs. Val: 'no
crowd, or fuss, or anything of that sort; just a few people that
we know are nice, in a quiet homely way.'

'Ah, that is so pleasing,' said M. Victoire: 'that is just what I
like; and is mademoiselle engaged for--?'

No. Mademoiselle was not engaged either for--or for--or for--
&c., &c., &c.; and then out came the little tablets, under the
dome of a huge greenhouse filled with the most costly exotics,
and Clementina and her fellow-labourer in the cause of Terpsichore
went to work to make their arrangements for the evening.

And the rest of the party followed them. Gertrude was accompanied
by an Englishman just as idle and quite as useless as M.
Victoire, of the butterfly tribe also, but not so graceful, and
without colour.

And then came the Misses Neverbend walking together, and with
them, one on each side, two tall Frenchmen, whose faces had been
remodelled in that mould into which so large a proportion of
Parisians of the present day force their heads, in order that
they may come out with some look of the Emperor about them. Were
there not some such machine as this in operation, it would be
impossible that so many Frenchmen should appear with elongated,
angular, hard faces, all as like each other as though they were
brothers! The cut of the beard, the long prickly-ended, clotted
moustache, which looks as though it were being continually rolled
up in saliva, the sallow, half-bronzed, apparently unwashed
colour--these may all, perhaps, be assumed by any man after a
certain amount of labour and culture. But how it has come to pass
that every Parisian has been able to obtain for himself a pair of
the Emperor's long, hard, bony, cruel-looking cheeks, no
Englishman has yet been able to guess. That having the power they
should have the wish to wear this mask is almost equally
remarkable. Can it be that a political phase, when stamped on a
people with an iron hand of sufficient power of pressure, will
leave its impress on the outward body as well as on the inward
soul? If so, a Frenchman may, perhaps, be thought to have gained
in the apparent stubborn wilfulness of his countenance some
recompense for his compelled loss of all political wilfulness
whatever.

Be this as it may, the two Misses Neverbend walked on, each with
a stubborn long-faced Frenchman at her side, looking altogether
not ill pleased at this instance of the excellence of French
manners. After them came Linda, talking to some acquaintance of
her own, and then poor dear little Katie with another Frenchman,
sterner, more stubborn-looking, more long-faced, more like the
pattern after whom he and they had been remodelled, than any of
them.

Poor little Katie! This was her first day in public. With many
imploring caresses, with many half-formed tears in her bright
eyes, with many assurances of her perfect health, she had induced
her mother to allow her to come to the flower-show; to allow her
also to go to Mrs. Val's dance, at which there were to be none
but such very nice people. Katie was to commence her life, to
open her ball with this flower-show. In her imagination it was
all to be one long bright flower-show, in which, however, the
sweet sorrowing of the sensitive plant would ever and anon invite
her to pity and tears. When she entered that narrow portal she
entered the world, and there she found herself walking on the
well-mown grass with this huge, stern, bearded Frenchman by her
side! As to talking to him, that was quite out of the question.
At the gate some slight ceremony of introduction had been gone
through, which had consisted in all the Frenchmen taking off
their hats and bowing to the two married ladies, and in the
Englishmen standing behind and poking the gravel with their
canes. But in this no special notice had of course been taken of
Katie; and she had a kind of idea, whence derived she knew not,
that it would be improper for her to talk to this man, unless she
were actually and _bona fide_ introduced to him. And then,
again, poor Katie was not very confident in her French, and then
her companion was not very intelligible in his English; so when
the gentleman asked, 'Is it that mademoiselle lofe de fleurs?'
poor little Katie felt herself tremble, and tried in vain to
mutter something; and when, again essaying to do his duty, he
suggested that 'all de beaute of Londres did delight to valk
itself at Chisveek,' she was equally dumb, merely turning on him
her large eyes for one moment, to show that she knew that he
addressed her. After that he walked on as silent as herself,
still keeping close to her side; and other ladies, who had not
the good fortune to have male companions, envied her happiness in
being so attended.

But Alaric and Charley were coming, she knew; Alaric was her
brother-in-law now, and therefore she would be delighted to meet
him; and Charley, dear Charley! she had not seen him since he
went away that morning, now four days since; and four days was a
long time, considering that he had saved her life. Her busy
little fingers had been hard at work the while, and now she had
in her pocket the purse which she had been so eager to make, and
which she was almost afraid to bestow.

'Oh, Linda,' she had said, 'I don't think I will, after all; it
is such a little thing.'

'Nonsense, child, you wouldn't give him a worked counterpane;
little things are best for presents.'

'But it isn't good enough,' she said, looking at her handiwork in
despair. But, nevertheless, she persevered, working in the golden
beads with constant diligence, so that she might be able to give
it to Charley among the Chiswick flowers. Oh! what a place it was
in which to bestow a present, with all the eyes of all the world
upon her!

And then this dance to which she was going! The thought of what
she would do there troubled her. Would anyone ask her to dance?
Would Charley think of her when he had so many grown-up girls,
girls quite grown up, all around him? It would be very sad if at
this London party it should be her fate to sit down the whole
evening and see others dance. It would suffice for her, she
thought, if she could stand up with Linda, but she had an idea
that this would not be allowed at a London party; and then Linda,
perhaps, might not like it. Altogether she had much upon her
mind, and was beginning to think that, perhaps, she might have
been happier to have stayed at home with her mamma. She had not
quite recovered from the effect of her toss into the water, or
the consequent excitement, and a very little misery would upset
her. And so she walked on with her Napoleonic companion, from
whom she did not know how to free herself, through one glass-
house after another, across lawns and along paths, attempting
every now and then to get a word with Linda, and not at all so
happy as she had hoped to have been.

At last Gertrude came to her rescue. They were all congregated
for a while in one great flower-house, and Gertrude, finding
herself near her sister, asked her how she liked it all.

'Oh! it is very beautiful,' said Katie, 'only--'

'Only what, dear?'

'Would you let me come with you a little while! Look here'--and
she crept softly around to the other side of her sister, sidling
with little steps away from the Frenchman, at whom, however, she
kept furtively looking, as though she feared that he would detect
her in the act. 'Look here, Gertrude,' she said, twitching her
sister's arm; 'that gentleman there--you see him, don't you? he's
a Frenchman, and I don't know how to get away from him.'