Page:Once a Week Dec 1860 to June 61.pdf/156

. 9, 1861.] good and bad have happened to us without any presentiments. Perhaps they do not come when they are asked for.”

“I was just going to say yes,” sobbed his wife, “for I was taking the wish for the thing, when I felt that I was going to utter a falsehood. I only pray that all may be well.”

“God grant it. But on one thing I am resolved. I will test that story which has framed itself to me out of a parcel of trifles which one is ashamed to call facts.”

“I felt that you were saying it all to draw me away from darker views, and I took it as kindness, though I could not believe in it,” said Beatrice, on her husband’s bosom.

“But as I spoke it grew upon me,” said he; “and I will send through Aventayle, who has agents in Paris. Meantime, dear, try and make those children as happy as you can. It is a comfort that they love you as if you were their mother.”

“I understand you, Charles,” said Beatrice, “but darling, do not talk so—at least now.”

“ course,” said Mr. Aventayle, “always show him up. Stay, clear a seat of some kind for him, can’t you?”

The inquiry did not seem altogether beside the mark. For though the manager’s room at the theatre was a tolerably large one, it was so completely choked up with his Varieties, as he called them, that any disarrangement of that chaos threatened a general confluence of matter. It would be almost easier to say what was not in the room than what was, or at all events the latter feat could only be accomplished by the pen of an untiring inventory-maker, who should not be deterred from his work by any surprises, or for a moment drawn into the feeble belief that classification was a possibility. Upon the dusty crimson cushion of a white and elegantly gilded chair, in which some theatrical nobleman of the Regency date had sat, and uttered exceedingly improper sentiments during the progress of a melodrama, reposed a handsome Skye terrier, and it naturally seemed his place to move in favour of a visitor. But Mop was of an opposite opinion, and signified it by so resolute a growl when the manager’s servant touched the chair, that he abandoned the idea, and looked hopelessly round for some other quarter in which Mr. Hawkesley might be planted. But chaos was obdurate. To remove from an old couch near the fire-place a vast heap of manuscripts and newspapers, was more than Beeton’s place was worth, Mr. Aventayle always declaring that he had placed everything there in exact order, and knew where to lay his hand upon it. Any of the big wooden boxes, some piled on others, would have made a good seat, but then on one was a great chandelier, and another held a pyramid of books that Aventayle had bought, as curiosities, at a sale, and would never have time to look into while he had eyes to read them. A model of his stage, with the scenery, in miniature, of a celebrated “effect,” was mounted on another box, and Vister, the wonderful painter, had, in reply to the objurgations of his manager, taken a solemn oath, every evening for some months, to remove it the next morning, but meantime it was there. A window seat seemed more promising, but to utilise that for social purposes involved the moving a lamp which stood in a little pool of oil, about eight hats of various shapes and ages, and a plaster caricature statue of M. Alexandre Dumas, the regenerator of Italy. So, with a helpless look that comprised his employer’s whole room, the portraits of the ladies and gentlemen of the company in characters in which they had been painted, the suspended list of pieces, with the number of nights each had run, the manager’s table, loaded with letters that overflowed the small island he sought to keep for his writing-place, the water-bottle and tumbler flanking the splendid French clock that was never right, but now and then, by frantically striking nineteen, claimed the privilege of genius to do as it pleased, and the grand array of bandboxes, music-books, swords, boots, and images, with which it pleased Mr. Aventayle to surround himself, Beeton withdrew to bring up Mr. Hawkesley.

He did not leave the manager solitary, for by his side stood a fiend. That is to say, one of the most accomplished members of the company, dressed for some Mephistophilean part, but with rather more diabolic adjuncts than are usually given to the friend of Faust, was in counsel with his manager, and in the dim light of the shaded lamp, looked, as he stood by the huge black chair of his chief, as if he were tempting the latter to sign some unhallowed compact. The thought, however, would not have occurred to any person likely to enter that room; a few years of practical stage life wear out any fancies arising from theatrical accidents, and it is perhaps difficult to bore an actor more completely than by what you deem facetiousness, based on topics from his own profession.

“You know Hawkesley, Grayling, don’t you?”

“Yes, to be sure. A capital fellow, and a decidedly clever one. Has he got anything for us?”

“I hope so.”

Mr. Aventayle, still a handsome man, though considerably past middle life, and retaining the play of features—fine ones—which had in earlier days materially aided him to eminence, placed his double-glass to his eyes, as he heard Hawkesley’s step, and when the latter entered affected to survey him with intense curiosity. Then, without speaking, he dropped the glasses, as if hopelessly.

“No! I do not see three acts in that face. Do you, Grayling?” he asked of the fiend.

“Well, I am not much of a physiognomist, but I think I see two, and perhaps a prologue,” said the actor, shaking hands with Hawkesley.

“Ah, you were always of a cheerful nature. Mop, you old fool, will you come down?” said the manager, spilling out the reluctant animal to the ground, and inducting Hawkesley into the nobleman’s seat. “I’m very glad to see you, on any terms,” he continued, “as it shows that you have a hankering after the place. What will you have to drink?”

“What have you got that is good on a warm night?’night?” [sic]