By all means, Rosa, if you wish it. Might I ask why?
O! because I dont want the girls to see you.
Its a fine day; but would you like me to carry an umbrella up?
Dont be foolish, sir. You havent got polished leather boots on, pouting, with one shoulder raised.
Perhaps that might escape the notice of the girls, even if they did see me, remarks Edwin, looking down at his boots with a sudden distaste for them.
Nothing escapes their notice, sir. And then I know what would happen. Some of them would begin reflecting on me by saying (for they are free) that they never will on any account engage themselves to lovers without polished leather boots. Hark! Miss Twinkleton. Ill ask for leave.
That discreet lady being indeed heard without, inquiring of nobody in a blandly conversational tone as she advances: Eh? Indeed! Are you quite sure you saw my mother-of-pearl button-holder on the work-table in my room? is at once solicited for walking leave, and graciously accords it. And soon the young couple go out of the Nuns House, taking all precautions against the discovery of the so vitally defective boots of Mr. Edwin Drood: precautions, let us hope, effective for the peace of Mrs. Edwin Drood that is to be.
Which way shall we take, Rosa?
Rosa replies: I want to go to the Lumps-of-Delight shop.
To the ?
A Turkish sweetmeat, sir. My gracious me, dont you understand anything? Call yourself an Engineer, and not know that?
Why, how should I know it, Rosa?
Because I am very fond of them. But O! I forgot what we are to pretend. No, you neednt know anything about them; never mind.
So he is gloomily borne off to the Lumps-of-Delight shop, where Rosa makes her purchase, and, after offering some to him (which he rather indignantly declines), begins to partake of it with great zest: previously taking off and rolling up a pair of little pink gloves, like rose-leaves, and occasionally putting her little pink fingers to her rosy lips, to cleanse them from the Dust of Delight that comes off the Lumps.
Now, be a good-tempered Eddy, and pretend. And so you are engaged?
And so I am engaged.
Is she nice?
Charming.
Tall?
Immensely tall! Rosa being short.
Must be gawky, I should think, is Rosas quiet commentary.
I beg your pardon; not at all, contradiction rising in him.
What is termed a fine woman; a splendid woman.
Big nose, no doubt, is the quiet commentary again.
Not a little one, certainly, is the quick reply, (Rosas being a little one.)
Long pale nose, with a red knob in the middle. I know the sort of nose, says Rosa, with a satisfied nod, and tranquilly enjoying the Lumps.
You dont know the sort of nose, Rosa, with some warmth; because its nothing of the kind.
Not a pale nose, Eddy?
No. Determined not to assent.
A red nose? O! I dont like red noses. However; to be sure she can always powder it.
She would scorn to powder it, says Edwin, becoming heated.
Would she? What a stupid thing she must be! Is she stupid in everything?
No; in nothing.
After a pause, in which the whimsically wicked face has not been unobservant of him, Rosa says:
And this most sensible of creatures likes the idea of being carried off to Egypt; does she, Eddy?
Yes. She takes a sensible interest in triumphs of engineering skill: especially when they are to change the whole condition of an undeveloped country.
Lor! says Rosa, shrugging her shoulders, with a little laugh of wonder.
Do you object, Edwin inquires, with a majestic turn of his eyes downward upon the fairy figure: do you object, Rosa, to her feeling that interest?
Object? my dear Eddy! But really, doesnt she hate boilers and things?
I can answer for her not being so idiotic as to hate Boilers, he returns with angry emphasis; though I cannot answer for her views about Things; really not understanding what Things are meant.
But dont she hate Arabs, and Turks, and Fellahs, and people?
Certainly not. Very firmly.
At least she must hate the Pyramids? Come, Eddy?
Why should she be such a little tall, I mean goose, as to hate the Pyramids, Rosa?
Ah! you should hear Miss Twinkleton, often nodding her head, and much enjoying the Lumps, bore about them, and then you wouldnt ask. Tiresome old burying-grounds! Isises, and Ibises, and Cheopses, and Pharaohses; who cares about them? And then there was Belzoni, or somebody, dragged out by the legs, half-choked with bats and dust. All the girls say: Serve him right, and hope it hurt him, and wish he had been quite choked.
The two youthful figures, side by side, but not now arm-in-arm, wander discontentedly about the old Close; and each sometimes stops and slowly imprints a deeper footstep in the fallen leaves.
Well! says Edwin, after a lengthy silence. According to custom. We cant get on, Rosa.
Rosa tosses her head, and says she dont want to get on.
Thats a pretty sentiment, Rosa, considering.
Considering what?
If I say what, youll go wrong again.
Youll go wrong, you mean, Eddy. Dont be ungenerous.
Ungenerous! I like that!
Then I dont like that, and so I tell you plainly, Rosa pouts.
Now, Rosa, I put it to you. Who disparaged my profession, my destination
You are not going to be buried in the Pyramids, I hope? she interrupts, arching her delicate eyebrows. You never said you were. If you are, why havent you mentioned it to me? I cant find out your plans by instinct.
Now, Rosa, you know very well what I mean, my dear.
Well then, why did you begin with your detestable red-nosed giantesses? And she would, she would, she would, she would, she would powder it! cries Rosa, in a little burst of comical contradictory spleen.
Somehow or other, I never can come right in these discussions, says Edwin, sighing and becoming resigned.
How is it possible, sir, that you ever can come right when youre always wrong? And as to Belzoni, I suppose hes dead; Im sure I hope he is and how can his legs or his chokes concern you?
It is nearly time for your return, Rosa. We have not had a very happy walk, have we?
A happy walk? A detestably unhappy walk, sir. If I go up-stairs the moment I get in and cry till I cant take my dancing lesson, you are responsible, mind!
Let us be friends, Rosa.
Ah! cries Rosa, shaking her head and bursting into real tears, I wish we could be friends! Its because we cant be friends, that we try one another so. I am a young little thing, Eddy, to have an old heartache; but I really, really have, sometimes. Dont be angry. I know you have one yourself too often. We should both of us have done better, if What is to be had been left What might have been. I am quite a little serious thing now, and not teasing you. Let each of us forbear, this one time, on our own account, and on the others!
Disarmed by this glimpse of a womans nature in the spoilt child, though for an instant disposed to resent it as seeming to involve the enforced infliction of himself upon her, Edwin Drood stands watching her as she childishly cries and sobs, with both hands to the handkerchief at her eyes, and then she becoming more composed, and indeed beginning in her young inconstancy to laugh at herself for having been so moved leads her to a seat hard by, under the elm-trees.
One clear word of understanding, Pussy dear. I am not clever out of my own line now I come to think of it, I dont know that I am particularly clever in it but I want to do right. There is not there may be I really dont see my way to what I want to say, but I must say it before we part there is not any other young
O no, Eddy! Its generous of you to ask me; but no, no, no!
They have come very near to the Cathedral windows, and at this moment the organ and the choir sound out sublimely. As they sit listening to the solemn swell, the confidence of last night rises in young Edwin Droods mind, and he thinks how unlike this music is to that discordance.
I fancy I can distinguish Jacks voice, is his remark in a low tone in connection with the train of thought.
Take me back at once, please, urges his Affianced, quickly laying her light hand upon his wrist. They will all be coming out directly; let us get away. O, what a resounding chord! But dont let us stop to listen to it; let us get away!
Her hurry is over as soon as they have passed out of the Close. They go arm-in-arm now, gravely and deliberately enough, along the old High-street, to the Nuns House. At the gate, the street being within sight empty, Edwin bends down his face to Rosebuds.
She remonstrates, laughing, and is a childish schoolgirl again.
Eddy, no! Im too sticky to be kissed. But give me your hand, and Ill blow a kiss into that.
He does so. She breathes a light breath into it and asks, retaining it and looking into it:
Now say, what do you see?
See, Rosa?
Why, I thought you Egyptian boys could look into a hand and see all sorts of phantoms. Cant you see a happy Future?
For certain, neither of them sees a happy Present, as the gate opens and closes, and one goes in, and the other goes away.
CHAPTER IV MR. SAPSEA
Accepting the Jackass as the type of self-sufficient stupidity and conceit a custom, perhaps, like some few other customs, more conventional than fair then the purest jackass in Cloisterham is Mr. Thomas Sapsea, Auctioneer.
Mr. Sapsea dresses at the Dean; has been bowed to for the Dean, in mistake; has even been spoken to in the street as My Lord, under the impression that he was the Bishop come down unexpectedly, without his chaplain. Mr. Sapsea is very proud of this, and of his voice, and of his style. He has even (in selling landed property) tried the experiment of slightly intoning in his pulpit, to make himself more like what he takes to be the genuine ecclesiastical article. So, in ending a Sale by Public Auction, Mr. Sapsea finishes off with an air of bestowing a benediction on the assembled brokers, which leaves the real Dean a modest and worthy gentleman far behind.
Mr. Sapsea has many admirers; indeed, the proposition is carried by a large local majority, even including non-believers in his wisdom, that he is a credit to Cloisterham. He possesses the great qualities of being portentous and dull, and of having a roll in his speech, and another roll in his gait; not to mention a certain gravely flowing action with his hands, as if he were presently going to Confirm the individual with whom he holds discourse. Much nearer sixty years of age than fifty, with a flowing outline of stomach, and horizontal creases in his waistcoat; reputed to be rich; voting at elections in the strictly respectable interest; morally satisfied that nothing but he himself has grown since he was a baby; how can dunder-headed Mr. Sapsea be otherwise than a credit to Cloisterham, and society?
Mr. Sapseas premises are in the High-street, over against the Nuns House. They are of about the period of the Nuns House, irregularly modernised here and there, as steadily deteriorating generations found, more and more, that they preferred air and light to Fever and the Plague. Over the doorway is a wooden effigy, about half life-size, representing Mr. Sapseas father, in a curly wig and toga, in the act of selling. The chastity of the idea, and the natural appearance of the little finger, hammer, and pulpit, have been much admired.
Mr. Sapsea sits in his dull ground-floor sitting-room, giving first on his paved back yard; and then on his railed-off garden. Mr. Sapsea has a bottle of port wine on a table before the fire the fire is an early luxury, but pleasant on the cool, chilly autumn evening and is characteristically attended by his portrait, his eight-day clock, and his weather-glass. Characteristically, because he would uphold himself against mankind, his weather-glass against weather, and his clock against time.
By Mr. Sapseas side on the table are a writing-desk and writing materials. Glancing at a scrap of manuscript, Mr. Sapsea reads it to himself with a lofty air, and then, slowly pacing the room with his thumbs in the arm-holes of his waistcoat, repeats it from memory: so internally, though with much dignity, that the word Ethelinda is alone audible.
There are three clean wineglasses in a tray on the table. His serving-maid entering, and announcing Mr. Jasper is come, sir, Mr. Sapsea waves Admit him, and draws two wineglasses from the rank, as being claimed.
Glad to see you, sir. I congratulate myself on having the honour of receiving you here for the first time. Mr. Sapsea does the honours of his house in this wise.
You are very good. The honour is mine and the self-congratulation is mine.
You are pleased to say so, sir. But I do assure you that it is a satisfaction to me to receive you in my humble home. And that is what I would not say to everybody. Ineffable loftiness on Mr. Sapseas part accompanies these words, as leaving the sentence to be understood: You will not easily believe that your society can be a satisfaction to a man like myself; nevertheless, it is.
I have for some time desired to know you, Mr. Sapsea.
And I, sir, have long known you by reputation as a man of taste. Let me fill your glass. I will give you, sir, says Mr. Sapsea, filling his own:
When the French come over,
May we meet them at Dover!
This was a patriotic toast in Mr. Sapseas infancy, and he is therefore fully convinced of its being appropriate to any subsequent era.
You can scarcely be ignorant, Mr. Sapsea, observes Jasper, watching the auctioneer with a smile as the latter stretches out his legs before the fire, that you know the world.
Well, sir, is the chuckling reply, I think I know something of it; something of it.
Your reputation for that knowledge has always interested and surprised me, and made me wish to know you. For Cloisterham is a little place. Cooped up in it myself, I know nothing beyond it, and feel it to be a very little place.
If I have not gone to foreign countries, young man, Mr. Sapsea begins, and then stops: You will excuse me calling you young man, Mr. Jasper? You are much my junior.
By all means.
If I have not gone to foreign countries, young man, foreign countries have come to me. They have come to me in the way of business, and I have improved upon my opportunities. Put it that I take an inventory, or make a catalogue. I see a French clock. I never saw him before, in my life, but I instantly lay my finger on him and say Paris! I see some cups and saucers of Chinese make, equally strangers to me personally: I put my finger on them, then and there, and I say Pekin, Nankin, and Canton. It is the same with Japan, with Egypt, and with bamboo and sandalwood from the East Indies; I put my finger on them all. I have put my finger on the North Pole before now, and said Spear of Esquimaux make, for half a pint of pale sherry!