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Billy, feeling all the better for his dinner, and inspirited by sundry gulps of wine, proceeded to make himself comfortable, in order to open fire as soon as ever the coach got off the stones. He took a rapid retrospect of all the various angels he had encountered, those who had favoured him, those who had frowned, and he was decidedly of opinion that he had never seen anything to compare to the fair lady before him. He was rich and thriving and would please himself without consulting Want-nothin’-but-what’s-right Jerry, Half-a-yard-of-the-table Joe, or any of them. It wasn’t like as if they were to be in Co. with him in the lady. She would never come into the balance sheets. No; she was to be all his, and they had no business with it. He believed Want-nothin’-but-what’s-right would be glad if he never married. Just then the coach glid from the noisy pavement on to the comparatively speaking silent macadamised road, and Billy and the lady opened fire simultaneously, the lady about the discomforts of coach-travelling, which she had never tried before, and Billy about the smack of the Teneriffe, which he thought very earthy. He had some capital wine at home, he said, as everybody has. This led him to London, the street conveniences or inconveniences as they then were of the metropolis, which subject he plied for the purpose of finding out as well where the lady lived as whether her carriage would meet her or not; but this she skilfully parried, by asking Billy where he lived, and finding it was Doughty Street, Russell Square, she observed, as in truth it is, that it was a very airy part of the town, and proceeded to expatiate on the beauty of the flowers in Covent Garden, from whence she got to the theatres, then to the opera, intimating a very considerable acquaintance as well with the capital as with that enchanted circle, the West-end, comprising in its contracted limits what is called the world. Billy was puzzled. He wished she mightn’t be a cut above him—such lords, such ladies, such knowledge of the court—could she be a maid-of-honour? Well, he didn’t care. No ask no have, so he proceeded with the pumping process again. “Did she live in town?”
Fair Lady.—“Part of the year.”
Billy.—“During the season I ‘spose?”
Fair Lady.—“During the sitting of parliament.”
“There again!” thought Billy, feeling the expectation-funds fall ten per cent, at least. “Well, faint heart never won fair lady,” continued he to himself, considering how next he should sound her. She was very beautiful—what pretty pearly teeth she had, and such a pair of rosy lips—such a fair forehead too, and such nice hair—he’d give a fipun note for a kiss!—he’d give a tenpun note for a kiss!—dashed if he wouldn’t give a fifty-pun for a kiss. Then he wondered what Head-and-shoulders Smith would think of her. As he didn’t seem to be making much progress, however, in the information way, he now desisted from that consideration, and while contemplating her beauty considered how best he should carry on the siege. Should he declare who and what he was, making the best of himself of course, and ask her to be equally explicit, or should he beat about the bush a little longer and try to fish out what he could about her.
They had a good deal of day before them yet, dark though the latter part of it would be; which, however, on second thoughts, he felt might be rather favourable, inasmuch as she wouldn’t see when he was taken aback by her answers. He would beat about the bush a little longer. It was very pleasant sport.
“Did you say you lived in Chelsea?” at length asked Billy, in a stupid self-convicting sort of way.
“No,” replied the fair lady with a smile; “I never mentioned Chelsea.”
“Oh, no; no more you did,” replied Billy, taken aback, especially as the lady led up to no other place.
“Did she like the country?” at length asked he, thinking to try and fix her locality there, if he could not earth her in London.
“Yes, she liked the country, at least out of the season—there was no place like London in the season,” she thought.
Billy thought so too; it was the best place in summer, and the only place in winter.
Well, the lady didn’t know, but if she had to choose either place for a permanency, she would choose London.
This sent the Billy funds up a little. He forgot his intention of following her into the country, and began to expatiate upon the luxuries of London, the capital fish they got, the cod and hoyster sauce (for when excited, he knocked his h’s about a little), the cod and hoyster sauce, the turbot, the mackerel, the mullet, that woodcock of the sea, as he exultingly called it, thinking what a tuck-out he would have in revenge for his country inn abstinence. He then got upon the splendour of his own house in Doughty Street—the most agreeable in London. Its spacious entrance, its elegant stone staircase; his beautiful drawing-room, with its maroon and rose-coloured brocaded satin damask curtains, and rich Tournay carpet, its beautiful chandelier of eighteen lights, and Piccolo pianoforte, and was describing a most magnificent mirror—we don’t know what size, but most beautiful and becoming—when the pace of the vehicle was sensibly felt to relax; and before they had time to speculate on the cause, it had come to a stand-still.
“Stopped,” observed Billy, lowering the window to look out for squalls.
No sooner was the window down, than a head at the door proclaimed mischief. The tête-à-tête was at an end. The guard was going to put Pheasant-feather bonnet inside. Open sesame —W-h-i-s-h. In came the cutting wind—oh dear what a day!
“Rum for a leddy?” asked the guard, raising a great half-frozen, grog-blossomy face out of the blue and white coil of a shawl-cravat in which it was enveloped—“Git in” continued he, shouldering the leddy up the steps, without waiting for an answer, and in popped Pheasant-feathers; when, slamming-to the door, he cried “right!” to the coachman, and on went the vehicle, leaving the enterer to settle into a seat by its shaking, after the manner of the omnibus cads, who seem to think all they have to do is to see people past the door. As it was, the new-comer alighted upon Billy, who cannoned her off against the opposite door, and then made himself as big as he could, the better to incommode her. Pheasant-feathers, however, having effected an entrance, seemed to regard herself as good as her neighbours, and forthwith proceeded to adjust the window to her liking, despite the eyeing and staring of Miss Willing. Billy was indignant at the nasty peppermint-drop-smelling woman intruding between the wind and his beauty, and inwardly resolved he would dock the guard’s fee for his presumption in putting her there. Miss Willing gathered herself together as if afraid of contamination; and, forgetting her role, declared, after a jolt received in one of her seat-shiftings, that it was just the “smallest coach she had ever been in.” She then began to scrutinise her female companion’s attire.
A cottage-bonnet, made of pheasant-feathers; was there ever such a frightful thing seen—all the colours of the rainbow combined—must be a poacher’s daughter, or a poulterer’s. Paste egg-coloured ribbons; what a cloth pelisse—puce colour in some parts—bath-brick colour in others—nearly drab in others—thread-bare all over. Dare say she thought herself fine, with her braided waist, up to her ears. Her glazy gloves might be any colour—black, brown, green, gray. Then a qualm shot across Miss Willing’s mind that she had seen the pelisse before. Yes, no, yes; she believed it was the very one she had sold to Mrs. Pickles’ nursery governess for eighteen shillings. So it was. She had stripped the fur edging off herself, and there were the marks. Who could the wearer be? Where could she have got it? She could not recollect