Vanity Fair (70 page)

"And here's a candle, Mum, and if you please, Mum, I can show you
her room, Mum, and the press in the housekeeper's room, Mum, where
she keeps heaps and heaps of things, Mum," cried out the eager
little Hester with a profusion of curtseys.

"Hold your tongue, if you please. I know the room which the
creature occupies perfectly well. Mrs. Brown, have the goodness to
come with me, and Beddoes don't you lose sight of that woman," said
Mrs. Bute, seizing the candle. "Mr. Crawley, you had better go
upstairs and see that they are not murdering your unfortunate
brother"—and the calash, escorted by Mrs. Brown, walked away to the
apartment which, as she said truly, she knew perfectly well.

Bute went upstairs and found the Doctor from Mudbury, with the
frightened Horrocks over his master in a chair. They were trying to
bleed Sir Pitt Crawley.

With the early morning an express was sent off to Mr. Pitt Crawley
by the Rector's lady, who assumed the command of everything, and had
watched the old Baronet through the night. He had been brought back
to a sort of life; he could not speak, but seemed to recognize
people. Mrs. Bute kept resolutely by his bedside. She never seemed
to want to sleep, that little woman, and did not close her fiery
black eyes once, though the Doctor snored in the arm-chair.
Horrocks made some wild efforts to assert his authority and assist
his master; but Mrs. Bute called him a tipsy old wretch and bade him
never show his face again in that house, or he should be transported
like his abominable daughter.

Terrified by her manner, he slunk down to the oak parlour where Mr.
James was, who, having tried the bottle standing there and found no
liquor in it, ordered Mr. Horrocks to get another bottle of rum,
which he fetched, with clean glasses, and to which the Rector and
his son sat down, ordering Horrocks to put down the keys at that
instant and never to show his face again.

Cowed by this behaviour, Horrocks gave up the keys, and he and his
daughter slunk off silently through the night and gave up possession
of the house of Queen's Crawley.

In Which Becky Is Recognized by the Family

The heir of Crawley arrived at home, in due time, after this
catastrophe, and henceforth may be said to have reigned in Queen's
Crawley. For though the old Baronet survived many months, he never
recovered the use of his intellect or his speech completely, and the
government of the estate devolved upon his elder son. In a strange
condition Pitt found it. Sir Pitt was always buying and mortgaging;
he had twenty men of business, and quarrels with each; quarrels with
all his tenants, and lawsuits with them; lawsuits with the lawyers;
lawsuits with the Mining and Dock Companies in which he was
proprietor; and with every person with whom he had business. To
unravel these difficulties and to set the estate clear was a task
worthy of the orderly and persevering diplomatist of Pumpernickel,
and he set himself to work with prodigious assiduity. His whole
family, of course, was transported to Queen's Crawley, whither Lady
Southdown, of course, came too; and she set about converting the
parish under the Rector's nose, and brought down her irregular
clergy to the dismay of the angry Mrs Bute. Sir Pitt had concluded
no bargain for the sale of the living of Queen's Crawley; when it
should drop, her Ladyship proposed to take the patronage into her
own hands and present a young protege to the Rectory, on which
subject the diplomatic Pitt said nothing.

Mrs. Bute's intentions with regard to Miss Betsy Horrocks were not
carried into effect, and she paid no visit to Southampton Gaol. She
and her father left the Hall when the latter took possession of the
Crawley Arms in the village, of which he had got a lease from Sir
Pitt. The ex-butler had obtained a small freehold there likewise,
which gave him a vote for the borough. The Rector had another of
these votes, and these and four others formed the representative
body which returned the two members for Queen's Crawley.

There was a show of courtesy kept up between the Rectory and the
Hall ladies, between the younger ones at least, for Mrs. Bute and
Lady Southdown never could meet without battles, and gradually
ceased seeing each other. Her Ladyship kept her room when the
ladies from the Rectory visited their cousins at the Hall. Perhaps
Mr. Pitt was not very much displeased at these occasional absences
of his mamma-in-law. He believed the Binkie family to be the
greatest and wisest and most interesting in the world, and her
Ladyship and his aunt had long held ascendency over him; but
sometimes he felt that she commanded him too much. To be considered
young was complimentary, doubtless, but at six-and-forty to be
treated as a boy was sometimes mortifying. Lady Jane yielded up
everything, however, to her mother. She was only fond of her
children in private, and it was lucky for her that Lady Southdown's
multifarious business, her conferences with ministers, and her
correspondence with all the missionaries of Africa, Asia, and
Australasia, &c., occupied the venerable Countess a great deal, so
that she had but little time to devote to her granddaughter, the
little Matilda, and her grandson, Master Pitt Crawley. The latter
was a feeble child, and it was only by prodigious quantities of
calomel that Lady Southdown was able to keep him in life at all.

As for Sir Pitt he retired into those very apartments where Lady
Crawley had been previously extinguished, and here was tended by
Miss Hester, the girl upon her promotion, with constant care and
assiduity. What love, what fidelity, what constancy is there equal
to that of a nurse with good wages? They smooth pillows; and make
arrowroot; they get up at nights; they bear complaints and
querulousness; they see the sun shining out of doors and don't want
to go abroad; they sleep on arm-chairs and eat their meals in
solitude; they pass long long evenings doing nothing, watching the
embers, and the patient's drink simmering in the jug; they read the
weekly paper the whole week through; and Law's Serious Call or the
Whole Duty of Man suffices them for literature for the year—and we
quarrel with them because, when their relations come to see them
once a week, a little gin is smuggled in in their linen basket.
Ladies, what man's love is there that would stand a year's nursing
of the object of his affection? Whereas a nurse will stand by you
for ten pounds a quarter, and we think her too highly paid. At
least Mr. Crawley grumbled a good deal about paying half as much to
Miss Hester for her constant attendance upon the Baronet his father.

Of sunshiny days this old gentleman was taken out in a chair on the
terrace—the very chair which Miss Crawley had had at Brighton, and
which had been transported thence with a number of Lady Southdown's
effects to Queen's Crawley. Lady Jane always walked by the old man,
and was an evident favourite with him. He used to nod many times to
her and smile when she came in, and utter inarticulate deprecatory
moans when she was going away. When the door shut upon her he would
cry and sob—whereupon Hester's face and manner, which was always
exceedingly bland and gentle while her lady was present, would
change at once, and she would make faces at him and clench her fist
and scream out "Hold your tongue, you stoopid old fool," and twirl
away his chair from the fire which he loved to look at—at which he
would cry more. For this was all that was left after more than
seventy years of cunning, and struggling, and drinking, and
scheming, and sin and selfishness—a whimpering old idiot put in and
out of bed and cleaned and fed like a baby.

At last a day came when the nurse's occupation was over. Early one
morning, as Pitt Crawley was at his steward's and bailiff's books in
the study, a knock came to the door, and Hester presented herself,
dropping a curtsey, and said,

"If you please, Sir Pitt, Sir Pitt died this morning, Sir Pitt. I
was a-making of his toast, Sir Pitt, for his gruel, Sir Pitt, which
he took every morning regular at six, Sir Pitt, and—I thought I
heard a moan-like, Sir Pitt—and—and—and—" She dropped another
curtsey.

What was it that made Pitt's pale face flush quite red? Was it
because he was Sir Pitt at last, with a seat in Parliament, and
perhaps future honours in prospect? "I'll clear the estate now with
the ready money," he thought and rapidly calculated its incumbrances
and the improvements which he would make. He would not use his
aunt's money previously lest Sir Pitt should recover and his outlay
be in vain.

All the blinds were pulled down at the Hall and Rectory: the church
bell was tolled, and the chancel hung in black; and Bute Crawley
didn't go to a coursing meeting, but went and dined quietly at
Fuddleston, where they talked about his deceased brother and young
Sir Pitt over their port. Miss Betsy, who was by this time married
to a saddler at Mudbury, cried a good deal. The family surgeon rode
over and paid his respectful compliments, and inquiries for the
health of their ladyships. The death was talked about at Mudbury
and at the Crawley Arms, the landlord whereof had become reconciled
with the Rector of late, who was occasionally known to step into the
parlour and taste Mr. Horrocks' mild beer.

"Shall I write to your brother—or will you?" asked Lady Jane of her
husband, Sir Pitt.

"I will write, of course," Sir Pitt said, "and invite him to the
funeral: it will be but becoming."

"And—and—Mrs. Rawdon," said Lady Jane timidly.

"Jane!" said Lady Southdown, "how can you think of such a thing?"

"Mrs. Rawdon must of course be asked," said Sir Pitt, resolutely.

"Not whilst I am in the house!" said Lady Southdown.

"Your Ladyship will be pleased to recollect that I am the head of
this family," Sir Pitt replied. "If you please, Lady Jane, you will
write a letter to Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, requesting her presence upon
this melancholy occasion."

"Jane, I forbid you to put pen to paper!" cried the Countess.

"I believe I am the head of this family," Sir Pitt repeated; "and
however much I may regret any circumstance which may lead to your
Ladyship quitting this house, must, if you please, continue to
govern it as I see fit."

Lady Southdown rose up as magnificent as Mrs. Siddons in Lady
Macbeth and ordered that horses might be put to her carriage. If
her son and daughter turned her out of their house, she would hide
her sorrows somewhere in loneliness and pray for their conversion to
better thoughts.

"We don't turn you out of our house, Mamma," said the timid Lady
Jane imploringly.

"You invite such company to it as no Christian lady should meet, and
I will have my horses to-morrow morning."

"Have the goodness to write, Jane, under my dictation," said Sir
Pitt, rising and throwing himself into an attitude of command, like
the portrait of a Gentleman in the Exhibition, "and begin. 'Queen's
Crawley, September 14, 1822.—My dear brother—'"

Hearing these decisive and terrible words, Lady Macbeth, who had
been waiting for a sign of weakness or vacillation on the part of
her son-in-law, rose and, with a scared look, left the library.
Lady Jane looked up to her husband as if she would fain follow and
soothe her mamma, but Pitt forbade his wife to move.

"She won't go away," he said. "She has let her house at Brighton
and has spent her last half-year's dividends. A Countess living at
an inn is a ruined woman. I have been waiting long for an
opportunity—to take this—this decisive step, my love; for, as you
must perceive, it is impossible that there should be two chiefs in a
family: and now, if you please, we will resume the dictation. 'My
dear brother, the melancholy intelligence which it is my duty to
convey to my family must have been long anticipated by,'" &c.

In a word, Pitt having come to his kingdom, and having by good luck,
or desert rather, as he considered, assumed almost all the fortune
which his other relatives had expected, was determined to treat his
family kindly and respectably and make a house of Queen's Crawley
once more. It pleased him to think that he should be its chief. He
proposed to use the vast influence that his commanding talents and
position must speedily acquire for him in the county to get his
brother placed and his cousins decently provided for, and perhaps
had a little sting of repentance as he thought that he was the
proprietor of all that they had hoped for. In the course of three
or four days' reign his bearing was changed and his plans quite
fixed: he determined to rule justly and honestly, to depose Lady
Southdown, and to be on the friendliest possible terms with all the
relations of his blood.

So he dictated a letter to his brother Rawdon—a solemn and
elaborate letter, containing the profoundest observations, couched
in the longest words, and filling with wonder the simple little
secretary, who wrote under her husband's order. "What an orator
this will be," thought she, "when he enters the House of Commons"
(on which point, and on the tyranny of Lady Southdown, Pitt had
sometimes dropped hints to his wife in bed); "how wise and good, and
what a genius my husband is! I fancied him a little cold; but how
good, and what a genius!"

The fact is, Pitt Crawley had got every word of the letter by heart
and had studied it, with diplomatic secrecy, deeply and perfectly,
long before he thought fit to communicate it to his astonished wife.

This letter, with a huge black border and seal, was accordingly
despatched by Sir Pitt Crawley to his brother the Colonel, in
London. Rawdon Crawley was but half-pleased at the receipt of it.
"What's the use of going down to that stupid place?" thought he. "I
can't stand being alone with Pitt after dinner, and horses there and
back will cost us twenty pound."

He carried the letter, as he did all difficulties, to Becky,
upstairs in her bedroom—with her chocolate, which he always made
and took to her of a morning.