Melting from this stern and obdurate, into the tender and pathetic mood, Mr. Swiveller groaned a little, walked wildly up and down, and even made a show of tearing his hair, which however he thought better of, and wrenched the tassel from his nightcap instead. At last, undressing himself with a gloomy resolution, he got into bed.
Some men in his blighted position would have taken to drinking; but as Mr. Swiveller had taken to that before, he only took, on receiving the news that Sophy Wackles was lost to him forever, to playing the flute; thinking after mature consideration that it was a good, sound, dismal occupation, not only in unison with his own sad thoughts, but calculated to awaken a fellow-feeling in the bosoms of his neighbours. In pursuance of this resolution, he now drew a little table to his bedside, and arranging the light and a small oblong music-book to the best advantage, took his flute from its box, and began to play most mournfully.
The air was “Away with melancholy”—a composition, which, when it is played very slowly on the flute in bed, with the further disadvantage of being performed by a gentleman but imperfectly acquainted with the instrument, who repeats one note a great many times before he can find the next, has not a lively effect. Yet for half the night, or more, Mr. Swiveller, lying sometimes on his back with his eyes upon the ceiling, and sometimes half out of bed to correct himself by the book, played this unhappy tune over and over again; never leaving off, save for a minute or two at a time to take breath and soliloquize about the Marchioness, and then beginning again with renewed vigour. It was not until he had quite exhausted his several subjects of meditation, and had breathed into the flute the whole sentiment of the purl down to its very dregs, and had nearly maddened the people of the house, and at both the next doors, and over the way—that he shut up the music-book, extinguished the candle, and finding himself greatly lightened and relieved in his mind, turned round and fell asleep.
He awoke in the morning, much refreshed; and having taken half an hour’s exercise at the flute, and graciously received a notice to quit from his landlady, who had been in waiting on the stairs for that purpose since the dawn of day, repaired to Bevis Marks; where the beautiful Sally was already at her post, bearing in her looks a radiance mild as that which beameth from the virgin moon.
Mr. Swiveller acknowledged her presence by a nod, and exchanged his coat for the aquatic jacket; which usually took some time fitting on, for in consequence of a tightness in the sleeves, it was only to be got into by a series of struggles. This difficulty overcome, he took his seat at the desk.
“I say”—quoth Miss Brass, abruptly breaking silence, “you haven’t seen a silver pencil-case this morning, have you?”
“I didn’t meet many in the street,” rejoined Mr. Swiveller. “I saw one—a stout pencil-case of respectable appearance—but as he was in company with an elderly penknife and a young toothpick, with whom he was in earnest conversation, I felt a delicacy in speaking to him.”
“No, but have you?” returned Miss Brass. “Seriously, you know.”
“What a dull dog you must be to ask me such a question seriously,” said Mr. Swiveller. “Haven’t I this moment come?”
“Well, all I know is,” replied Miss Sally, “that it’s not to be found, and that it disappeared one day this week, when I left it on the desk.”
“Halloa!” thought Richard, “I hope the Marchioness hasn’t been at work here.”
“There was a knife too,” said Miss Sally, “of the same pattern. They were given to me by my father, years ago, and are both gone. You haven’t missed anything yourself, have you?”
Mr. Swiveller involuntarily clapped his hands to the jacket to be quite sure that it was a jacket and not a skirted coat; and having satisfied himself of the safety of this, his only moveable in Bevis Marks, made answer in the negative.
“It’s a very unpleasant thing, Dick”—said Miss Brass, pulling out the tin box and refreshing herself with a pinch of snuff; “but between you and me—between friends you know, for if Sammy knew it, I should never hear the last of it—some of the office money, too, that has been left about, has gone in the same way. In particular, I have missed three half-crowns at three different times.”
“You don’t mean that,” cried Dick. “Be careful what you say, old boy, for this is a serious matter. Are you quite sure? Is there no mistake?”
“It is so, and there can’t be any mistake at all,” rejoined Miss Brass emphatically.
“Then by Jove,” thought Richard, laying down his pen, “I am afraid the Marchioness is done for!”
The more he discussed the subject in his thoughts, the more probable it appeared to Dick that the miserable little servant was the culprit. When he considered on what a spare allowance of food she lived, how neglected and untaught she was, and how her natural cunning had been sharpened by necessity and privation, he scarcely doubted it. And yet he pitied her so much, and felt so unwilling to have a matter of such gravity disturbing the oddity of their acquaintance, that he thought, and thought truly, that rather than receive fifty pounds down, he would have the Marchioness proved innocent.
While he was plunged in very profound and serious meditation upon this theme, Miss Sally sat shaking her head with an air of great mystery and doubt, when the voice of her brother Sampson, carolling a cheerful strain, was heard in the passage, and that gentleman himself, beaming with virtuous smiles, appeared.
“Mr. Richard sir, good morning. Here we are again sir, entering upon another day, with our bodies strengthened by slumber and breakfast, and our spirits fresh and flowing. Here we are, Mr. Richard, rising with the sun to run
