The widow and the marquess, or, Love and pride

CHAPTER I. " At three to-morrow, then," said Charles Saville

The assenting look of the heautiful girl to whom these words were addressed in a whisper, left no doubt upon Charles's mind of the punctuality of her attention to the appointment which he had just made to call in Harley Street, and form one of a party, which was to visit that most instructive and entertaining receptacle for natural curiosities, the Zoological Garden in the Regent's Park.

The beautiful girl was speedily hurried away from his side by her mother, and consigned to the care of an elderly gentleman ; and after receiving an injunction to wrap her shawl closely about her, was by the same elderly gentleman handed down the Opera House staircase, followed by the said affectionate mother, who had accepted the arm of the aforesaid Charles Saville.

They reached the carriage which " stopped the way." The elderly gentleman deposited his treasure within it, and then having placed her mother by ber side, bowed somewhat coldly to Saville, and stepped into the chariot himself. Flip, flap, flop, went the steps, bang went the door, up went the glass, up jumped the servant at the word " Home," off dashed the horses, and away went the carriage, leaving Saville (somewhat wounded by the abruptness of the parting,) under the Haymarket Colonnade encircled by a cloud of smoke rising from the surrounding links, and enveloped in a still deeper cloud of thought and mystification.

Saville had made his acquaintance with Mrs. Franklin and her daughter Harriet (the ladies in the carriage,) early in the season which was now drawing to a close ; to the latter he became daily and hourly more attached, and, truth to be told, the development of her amiable character and

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intellectual qualities entirely justified the opinion which he had formed of her on their first introduction to each other. Mrs. Franklin liked him, found him agreeable, good-natured, and kind, and received him cordially and warmly at her house, where for the last five or six weeks he had been a very frequent visitor.

The intercourse, however, between the young people, constant as it had been, gave rise to no suspicions in the mind of Harriet's mother, that any thing of a tenderer nature than friendship would be its result ; and it is extremely probable that she would have gone on in this blissful state of security for months and years, had not her suspicions been awakened by her elderly and worldly friend Mr. John Smith, who, on his first visit in Harley Street, after his return to London, saw at a glance the real state of the case, and established in his own mind the extent to which the attachment between the lovers, as he decided them to be, had already gone.

Mr. Smith, it must be mentioned, was not wholly disinterested in the investigation of this delicate matter. He had been a particularly intimate friend of Miss Franklin s father, he continued the particularly intimate friend of Miss Franklin s mother, and this of itself might be considered quite sufficient reason for his anxiety with regard to the welfare and prosperity of Miss Franklin herself; but this was not all, — Mr. Smitli had formed the resolution of uniting his fate with the Franklins, by a more tender and permanent connection, and had, since his return from Italy, where he much rejoiced to pass his winters, become as constant a visitor at the house of his late friend, as Charles Saville ; and it was in consequence of thus frequently meeting him and the young lady together, that he had come to the conclusion, that it was quite right Mrs. Franklin should be put upon her guard with respect to the gentle Philander, whose fortune was purely personal, and covered with his hat ; he had, in fact, nothing but an allowance of three or four hundred a year, and a dim and distant prospect of success at the bar, towards which, at the period we now refer to, he was eating his way, in Lincoln's Inn Hall.

In the eyes of Mr. Smith, who was immensely rich, no sin was so crying, no shame so fatal, as poverty. Having by industry and application to mercantile pursuits amassed a vast fortune, he felt that, in respecting wealth in others, he was paying himself a tacit compliment ; and having pretty well ascertained the amount of the possessions and expectations of Charles Saville, he thought the moment had arrived, when the eyes of his excellent friend should be opened to the dangerous position in which her lovely daughter was placed, by the permission of such an intimacy as evidently existed between her and the ill-starred object of the old gentleman's anger and suspicion.

It was rather unfortunate, by way of a coincidence, that this most opulent and respectable gentleman should have fixed one o'clock of the following day for a conversation with Mrs. Franklin, upon the subject of her daughter's sentiments towards Mr. Saville, who, it will be recollected, intended to do himself the honour of calling in Harley Street at three.

The moment Harriet heard of the arrangement, she felt a sort of intuitive certainty as to what would be the subject of the elderly gentleman's observations ; in her confidence touching which she was greatly supported by the circumstance of his having, during the preceding evening, thrown out one or two gentle hints of his displeasure at the intimacy which he perceived to exist between her and the young lawyer. That she dreaded the consequences of his discussion with her mother, is quite sufficient proof of the justice of Mr. Smith's suspicions : a sleepless night of anxious thoughts was the result of Mrs. Franklin's announcement of his intention ; and when she came to breakfast, there was evidence in Harriet's eyes that she had shed abundance of tears.

The sound of the clock striking one was followed almost instantaneously by the arrival of Mr. Smith ; who, much to Harriet's relief, preferred her absence from the lecture he was about to read, and begged to be left tete-a-tete with her mamma.

One has heard of the proverb which treats of the dexterity of killing two birds with one stone : the respectable

Smith, at the moment to which we are referring, afforded in his own person a beautiful illustration of the venerable adage ; for at the instant that his knock at the door in Harley Street set Harriet's heart in a flutter of fear, it put that of her mamma into a state of gentle agitation with hope.

Mrs. Franklin had nothing to live upon but a jointure which, at her death, reverted to the family of her late husband, and Harriet had, in all the world, but four or five thousand pounds. From what had at different times escaped Mr. Smith's white lips, she had for more than two years expected that which she now felt certain was at hand ; and although the respectable gentleman would be her third husband, still it would be so desirable a thing in point of money and comfort — for a lone woman needs a protector — and of such wonderful advantage to dear Harriet, that the plump and buxom widow of fifty-five saw no just let, hindrance, or impediment to her acceptance of the "lean and slippered " bosom friend of her late husband, at the age of sixty-four.

Thus were two hearts nearly allied to each other set beating with very different passions, while the respectable Smith proceeded to open his mind to the senior lady of the two. We call him respectable from his age and station ; but he had a sobriquet : he was generally known in the extensive circle of his own acquaintance as Twaddle Smith. Smith is a common name, and it is absolutely necessary to prefix some distinctive epithet to it in order to mark the " man." The " Rejected Addresses " have signalised two Smiths — Adam Smith is secured from the general confusion by the peculiarity of his Christian name (if Christian name Adam can be called) — Sidney Smith, the revered leader of battles, and Sidney Smith, the reverend conductor of reviews, are also well distinguished from the common Smithfield herd ; and so, in order to point the moral or adorn the tale, our elderly friend just mentioned was always called Twaddle Smith, for reasons, the value of which the reader will probably best appreciate, after having been permitted to hear the subject-matter of his dialogue with his fat, fair, and fifty-five friend, Mrs. Franklin.

" Mrs. F." said Mr. Smith, — it was a way he had of initialising — "I have long wished to speak to you upon certain matters connected with the state and arrangement of your family and establishment, and I have been at length driven peremptorily to put my design into execution, by circumstances which appear to me to be extremely likely to embarrass you if they continue in their present state."

" I shall be ready and too happy," said the expectant widow, " to adopt any suggestions which you may throw out for the better regulation of my little family affairs."

" I will be candid upon one point in the outset," said Mr. Smith ; " I think that your favourite, Mr. Saville, i% here considerably more than he should be. He is a beggar; smart and pert, I admit, and sees, I dare say, a good deal of what is called the world ; but I cannot endure that flippant manner with which he speaks upon all subjects, — a fellow of three hundred a year, ma'am, has no right to talk so."

" I never observed that sort of thing," said Mrs. Franklin; " I think him pleasant and good-humoured"

" So does Harriet," said Mr. Smith. " However, my dear madam, if what I have more particularly to propose for your consideration to-day, should prove acceptable to you, all that will be remedied by your removal, for some time, from the metropolis."

" I am all attention," said Mrs. Franklin.

" There is a prejudice," said her elderly companion " which has very generally obtained, but which I am sure is very ill founded, that a man long accustomed to bachelor habits is ill calculated to understand the happiness of married life ; I repeat, my dear Mrs. Franklin, that I am convinced of the fallacy of this opinion, or, as I before called it, prejudice."

" I really don't see," said Mrs. Franklin, who thought that she already began to perceive the drift of her most respectable friend's observations, " I really don't see why a man who has long lived single should be the less capable of appreciating the advantages of matrimony."

" You agree with me, then," said Mr. Smith, " and I

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agree with you as to the advantages of which you speak — and who so well as a lady who has already twice entered the happy state ? There can be no testimony so favourable to matrimony as a second marriage ; for who would return to a course of life after having been released from it, had it not been agreeable ? "

" I quite coincide with you there/' said Mrs. Franklin, who began to feel the blood mounting into her cheeks, and her heart bumping not very gently in her bosom ; tC I am sure, Mr. Smith, that as far as personal feelings go, a second, or even a third marriage, is practically the greatest compliment to those who are gone ; for, as you have justly observed, who would contract a second matrimonial engagement if they had not been happy in the first ? "

" Or who," said Mr. Smith, with an extremely gallant smile, " would enter into a third, unless she had been happy in the two former ones ? "

Mrs. Franklin smiled at the remark, which was a perfect corroboration of all her best suspicions.

Mr. Smith was old, but he was rich — he was dull and prosy, but then he was good-natured and kind. He had no family connections, although his namesakes were numerous ; and she thought, considering the slender character of her jointure, and the graceful smallness of her daughter's fortune, that if, as she foresaw, he intended to make her the offer, she would " pluck up a spirit," and take him as her third husband, not less estimable in her eyes from having been the intimate friend of her late much lamented second.

" I confess, Mrs. F.," said the exemplary proser, " that having now retired from business of every kind, I feel time hang heavy on my hands. I don't see to read very well ; I am too old to learn. I have nothing to write about, and although I belong to a most excellent and convenient club at the bottom of St. James's Street, I find few contemporaries, or indeed companions there. I think I should like quiet and a fine climate, and, if I could establish myself, return to Italy, the garden of the world, for which I contracted a feeling of devotion when much younger, and to which I constantly look back with a longing anxiety to return to it."

" What could be more delightful ? " said Mrs. Franklin.

" Now, what is your opinion ? " said Mr. Smith. " I am quite aware that I am a little farther advanced in life than the general run of bridegrooms ; but do you think — ah ! I see you smile — do you think I might find a being disposed to join her fate to mine, and permit me to make her the sole object of all my care and affection ? "

" Dear Mr. Smith/' said Mrs. Franklin, " how very oddly you talk ! how should J know ? "

" And yet," said Mr. Smith, " you are the only person in the world whom I should desire to consult upon the subject. Franklin, poor fellow, was considerably your senior when you were married ; and yet, pardon me for recurring to what is lost to us for ever, you were as happy as people could be."

" Very true," said the lady ; " and I am quite sure that any people may live happily and comfortably who, when they become, as in time they must, acquainted and familiarised with each other's tempers and dispositions, make up their minds to concede a little now and then ; for as I have ever found it, the subjects of disagreement between men and their wives are generally matters of very trivial importance in themselves."

" I flatter myself that in the event of succeeding in my object, I should be found quite ready to adopt your ideas upon these points," said the matured lover ; " and thus encouraged, I honestly admit that I consider my hopes of future comfort and enjoyment to be in your hands."

" My dear sir ! " said Mrs. Franklin.

" So it is," said the elderly gentleman. " I think you must have observed the general tenor of my conduct and conversation for the last few days ; and I have no difficulty in throwing myself upon your consideration. I never have seen a being calculated to form my happiness until now ; and having made the admission, I shall wait an answer with a patience proportioned to my anxiety."

" Why, really," said Mrs. Franklin, "I — I declare to you, you have taken me so completely by surprise that "

" Did Harriet never mention any thing to you of what I have said to her upon the subject?"

" Harriet," said Mrs. Franklin, " not she ; have you spoken to her ? "

" Not, perhaps, in direct terms," said Mr. Smith ; " but I have thrown out such hints as I thought she could not fail to understand."

" But why address her in the first instance ? " said Mrs. Franklin ; " I honestly confess that her position as relative to mine, is one of the difficulties I feel in listening to the proposition — what would become of her ? "

" Of course," said Mr. Smith, " she would go to Italy."

" But that might interfere with her prospects," said the mother.

" Her prospects ! " said the old gentleman ; " of course our prospects would be in common."

" Oh, I am quite sure of your honour and generosity," said Mrs. Franklin ; " but at her time of life, she naturally expects attention and beaux, or, as we used to call them in former days, Mr. S., sweethearts."

" Why, to be sure," replied the lover, " and naturally enough ; but not after she marries."

" Oh ! no," said the lady ; " but she is not married yet."

" But," said Smith, " going to be, I hope."

" What, to Mr. Saville ? " said her mother ; " how can you fancy such a thing — why, you say yourself the man's a beggar."

" I flattered myself, I had enlightened you upon this subject," said the elderly gentleman. " What I mean is that Harriet will not hesitate to accept of any advantageous offer which you yourself might approve ; she would not suffer any of the common prejudices against what is called a sad disparity of age to interfere with her comfortable and respectable establishment in life."

" She has not," said Mrs. Franklin, " that I know of, had any occasion to form a determination upon such a proposal."

" The time, then, has arrived," said the elderly Smith,

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getting animated. " Surely I have already said sufficient with regard to my views, intentions, hopes, and propositions."

" Ay," said Mrs. Franklin, " as far as you and I are concerned, Mr. Smith ; hut however willing I might be to listen to your solicitations, I suspect the effect produced upon her, by any such arrangement, would not very materially change her condition."

" My dear Mrs. Franklin," said Smith, who found that his aim was mistaken, and his object misunderstood, "I fear I have not been sufficiently explicit in my conversation. You mistake me ; my proposition applies to Harriet ; her hand I solicit ; and my present view is to interest you in my behalf, and induce you not only to sanction my offer, but support it with your influence and authority."

" My dear sir," said Mrs. Franklin, opening her eyes to their very greatest width, and elevating her eyebrows to their extreme altitude, " you surprise me ! — Harriet — why, she is a mere child."

" I am quite aware, as I before mentioned," said the matured swain, " that there exists a ' disparity of age' between us ; but still I flatter myself that her happiness will not be endangered by our union ; and I hope more especially for your aid and assistance in obtaining her consent, because, if 1 do not forget, your first marriage was made under somewhat similar circumstances : there was a ' disparity of age' in that case, and "

" You are perfectly right," said Mrs. Franklin, who, although greatly disappointed at the moment, by her companion's announcement of the real object of his affections, suddenly collected herself sufficiently to run through a hasty calculation in her mind, the result of which was, that Harriet would, if she married him, eventually become the possessor of all the wealth of the respectable Croesus before her ; and that, giving him the fair chances of an insurance office annuity table, he must infallibly leave her a young and blooming widow ; circumstances, of the value and importance of which she was quite aware, from having undergone a similar process herself. So far, therefore, from checking the ardour of the swain, she confined hei present exertions to concealing from him the mistake into which she had at first fallen, by fancying herself the goddess of his idolatry; and concluded a brief but interesting conversation, by sending for Harriet herself ; and having given her counsel for her conduct in accordance with her own views of the merits of the case, led her, loth enough, to the drawing-room, where the aspirant to her hand was waiting in breathless anxiety, and left the ill-assorted pair to their own inventions.

It was by this time just three o'clock ; and scarcely had that hour arrived when the punctual and devoted Saville's well-known knock was sounded on the door. He was expected and admitted; and as the servants could know nothing of what was passing in the higher circles of the family, was ushered into the room where Corydon and Phyllis were billing and cooing. Any thing much more unlucky could not well have happened. Saville in a moment felt himself de trop. Smith scarcely recognised him, but there were tears in Harriet's eyes. Any attempt to rally would have been vain ; and Charles was only rescued from his painful dilemma by a message from Mrs. Franklin, who begged him to come to her in her boudoir.

The conversation which passed between the parent and the pretender to Harriet's love was brief and bitter. Anticipating considerable difficulty in persuading her daughter into the very advantageous match now proposed, she did not think it wise, or just, or prudent, or proper, to tell Saville distinctly or positively that she was " otherwise disposed of." She liked Saville extremely, and did not desire to wound his feelings more deeply than necessary ; indeed, a most whimsical notion came into her head, to which, as she never mentioned it except in strict confidence, it may appear unfair to allude, which was neither more nor less than the faint possibility of inducing Saville to change the direction of his affections in favour of herself; for Saville had, during his acquaintance with the Franklins, acted so sedulously upon the proverbial advice that

" He who would the daughter win, Must with the mother first begin,"

that Mrs. Franklin, who moreover thought it might be well to offer her Harriet a practical justification of unequal marriages, was not quite sure that, she might not be accepted by a young man, although she had been overlooked by the older one. Mrs. Franklin, in making this calculation, throwing into the favourable scale the fact, that Saville was poor, and she was personally rich, and an opinion which she entertained that the lover's assiduities displayed to her daughter were considerably stimulated by a belief in her wealth, the histories about which were all without foundation. At all events, Mrs. Franklin wished to make Saville feel as easy as possible ; and therefore, in a few hurried words, she endeavoured to explain that their party to the Zoological Gardens was temporarily postponed, but that she would let him know the moment it was rearranged.

Having said this and rang the bell, she advanced so rapidly upon the astonished Saville, that he was obliged to back out of the room in double quick time, convinced in his own mind, that whether he was destined or not ever to see the nyl-ghaus, zebras, emus, bears, and bisons, of the Regent's Park, it was a matter of infinitely less probability that he should soon again behold the gentle, amiable, and beautiful Harriet Franklin.

Chapter II

It must be confessed, that the sudden appearance of Charles Saville in the drawing-room was anything but gratifying to the feelings of Mr. Smith, and little calculated to further his views with the young object of his affections. He came like a reproaching spirit, and stood before his love, and she acknowledged the rebuke which he thus tacitly and unconsciously gave; for, whatever might be his misgivings with regard to his own ultimate success, it had not yet flashed into his mind that the silver-headed Smith, he of the Twaddle, cased in a sable coat, and black satin shorts, shining like sticking-plaster, was doomed to be his rival.

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It is strange, and every hour we live the feeling grow?; upon reflection, stronger still, that the great and certain change which time inevitably works on the human mind and constitution, is, from its gradual and gentle course, imperceptible to the individual "worked upon," unless some great and sudden accession of disease falls upon him . the comparison between what he was at twenty-four and fifty-five, is never made by the subject himself; the only comparison lie makes, is between Monday last and Tuesday last, in which brief space no difference arises ; and thus it is, that if blest with health — and if with health the animal spirits continue — a man from constant habitude, feeling no change in himself from day to day, goes on believing that others see no change in him ; and it is rather to this natural imperceptibility of physical alteration, than to senile childishness, or matured vanity, that we find men advanced in life like our present friend Smith, presenting themselves to the favour of blooming girls, who were unborn at the period from which these respectable lovers date their perfection, and at which they set up their standard, and who seeing nothing but what is placed before them, cannot comprehend how the corpulent Mr. Fussocks, or the lanky Mr. Latham, can have the impertinence or temerity to enter the lists of love or flirtation at his time of life.

Smith, twaddler as he was, was, however, a man of plain common sense ; he saw in Harriet a being calculated, if she could divest her mind of the very small quantity of romance which it possessed, to make any man happy. He put into the opposite scale to his advanced age the increased luxuries and comforts which the advantage of his fortune would secure to her ; and considered from the gentleness and steadiness of the young lady's character and disposition, that she would consider the case dispassionately, and eventually prefer the certainty of opulence through life, to the precarious shiftings to which she might be exposed if she united herself to an idle student at law, who possessed too much versatility of genius to plod his way through the heavy road to the high places of the profession, and who, if he married, would in all probability devote himself more assiduously to the silk gown of his wife, than the stuff one of his profession.

But Smith, old and experienced as he was, miscalculated; he fell into the commonly received error of misfaking gentleness for weakness, and diffidence for want of energy. Harriet was unassuming and tender, and full of feeling ; but she could resist oppression and withstand injustice. To be sure the battle being in modern times generally to the strong, the influence of her mother, upon whom she depended for every thing in the way of fortune she was to possess, strengthened and enforced by that of Mr. Smith, the intimate and favoured friend of her father, required no trifling exertion to counteract its effects.

Harriet listened calmly and patiently to the elaborated lecture which Mr. Smith was pleased to deliver upon the philosophy of love, and the pre-eminent advantages of that peculiar species of passion which is founded upon esteem, and a long acquaintance with the merits and virtues of the desired object, for nearly two hours ; at the termination of which period, she flattered herself that she had dexterously contrived a reprieve for herself, by telling her respectable suitor that she must, in the first instance, consult her mother, and that after referring the whole subject to her consideration, she would, in the course of the evening, pronounce her own decision upon it.

This delay was by no means unpleasant to either party. Smith was gratified by receiving this sort of qualified attention to his proposal instead of a plump denial, and Harriet delighted in giving herself an opportunity of discussing it with her mother, conscious as she was of a preference for Charles Saville, and satisfied, even putting that out of the question, that the destruction of her happiness would be the inevitable consequence of her filial obedience.

Mr. Smith, at this juncture of the campaign, was not quite decided as to the next step he should take in the siege, which it appears he was carrying on as systematically as the French proceeded with that of Antwerp ; he felt himself already in the third parallel, and was neat..1/ as much surprised as Gerard at the faint opposition he had met with from the garrison ; but, like that hero upon the occasion to which I refer, he doubted the security of the calm which he was suffered to enjoy, and attributed the facility with which he had been permitted to make his advances, to a secret determination on the part of the besieged to undermine and blow him up the moment he attempted the storm.

If, thought he, I take my hat and go, at this crisis, it may seem as if I had been discouraged, and were dissatisfied with my reception ; if I hastily follow up what I believe to be a blow, I shall violate the truce to which I have agreed, and break in upon Harriet's design of a conference with her mother ; therefore will I steer the middle course, and merely give Mrs. Franklin the outline of my conversation with her daughter, and having thus " reported progress," ask leave to " come again to-morrow."

What his prudence and judgment suggested in this behoof, the cautious Smith forthwith put into practice ; and having found the much excited parent just recovering from the exertion of having ejected poor Charles Saville, imparted to her the particulars of his dialogue with Miss Franklin, and referring to the condition which she had exacted, or which rather he had conceded to her suggestion, proposed a visit the following day at two.