The Way We Live Now, Anthony Trollope [good story books to read .txt] 📗

was on her lover’s arm, in her best clothes, and going to have a dinner given to her. And her lover had told her that he had ever so many things⁠—ever so many things to say to her! But she would ask no impertinent questions in the first hour of her bliss. It was so pleasant to walk with him up to Pentonville;⁠—so joyous to turn into a gay enclosure, half public-house and half tea-garden; so pleasant to hear him order the good things, which in his company would be so nice! Who cannot understand that even an urban Rosherville must be an Elysium to those who have lately been eating their meals in all the gloom of a small London underground kitchen? There we will leave Ruby in her bliss.

At about nine that evening John Crumb called at Mrs. Pipkin’s, and was told that Ruby had gone out with Sir Felix Carbury. He hit his leg a blow with his fist, and glared out of his eyes. “He’ll have it hot some day,” said John Crumb. He was allowed to remain waiting for Ruby till midnight, and then, with a sorrowful heart, he took his departure.

LXXI John Crumb Falls Into Trouble

It was on a Friday evening, an inauspicious Friday, that poor Ruby Ruggles had insisted on leaving the security of her Aunt Pipkin’s house with her aristocratic and vicious lover, in spite of the positive assurance made to her by Mrs. Pipkin that if she went forth in such company she should not be allowed to return. “Of course you must let her in,” Mrs. Hurtle had said soon after the girl’s departure. Whereupon Mrs. Pipkin had cried. She knew her own softness too well to suppose it to be possible that she could keep the girl out in the streets all night; but yet it was hard upon her, very hard, that she should be so troubled. “We usen’t to have our ways like that when I was young,” she said, sobbing. What was to be the end of it? Was she to be forced by circumstances to keep the girl always there, let the girl’s conduct be what it might? Nevertheless she acknowledged that Ruby must be let in when she came back. Then, about nine o’clock, John Crumb came; and the latter part of the evening was more melancholy even than the first. It was impossible to conceal the truth from John Crumb. Mrs. Hurtle saw the poor man and told the story in Mrs. Pipkin’s presence.

“She’s headstrong, Mr. Crumb,” said Mrs. Hurtle.

“She is that, ma’am. And it was along wi’ the baro-nite she went?”

“It was so, Mr. Crumb.”

“Baro-nite! Well;⁠—perhaps I shall catch him some of these days;⁠—went to dinner wi’ him, did she? Didn’t she have no dinner here?”

Then Mrs. Pipkin spoke up with a keen sense of offence. Ruby Ruggles had had as wholesome a dinner as any young woman in London⁠—a bullock’s heart and potatoes⁠—just as much as ever she had pleased to eat of it. Mrs. Pipkin could tell Mr. Crumb that there was “no starvation nor yet no stint in her house.” John Crumb immediately produced a very thick and admirably useful blue cloth cloak, which he had brought up with him to London from Bungay, as a present to the woman who had been good to his Ruby. He assured her that he did not doubt that her victuals were good and plentiful, and went on to say that he had made bold to bring her a trifle out of respect. It was some little time before Mrs. Pipkin would allow herself to be appeased;⁠—but at last she permitted the garment to be placed on her shoulders. But it was done after a melancholy fashion. There was no smiling consciousness of the bestowal of joy on the countenance of the donor as he gave it, no exuberance of thanks from the recipient as she received it. Mrs. Hurtle, standing by, declared it to be perfect;⁠—but the occasion was one which admitted of no delight. “It’s very good of you, Mr. Crumb, to think of an old woman like me⁠—particularly when you’ve such a deal of trouble with a young ’un.”

“It’s like the smut in the wheat, Mrs. Pipkin, or the d’sease in the ’tatoes;⁠—it has to be put up with, I suppose. Is she very partial, ma’am, to that young baro-nite?” This question was asked of Mrs. Hurtle.

“Just a fancy for the time, Mr. Crumb,” said the lady.

“They never thinks as how their fancies may well-nigh half kill a man!” Then he was silent for awhile, sitting back in his chair, not moving a limb, with his eyes fastened on Mrs. Pipkin’s ceiling. Mrs. Hurtle had some work in her hand, and sat watching him. The man was to her an extraordinary being⁠—so constant, so slow, so unexpressive, so unlike her own countrymen⁠—willing to endure so much, and at the same time so warm in his affections! “Sir Felix Carbury!” he said. “I’ll Sir Felix him some of these days. If it was only dinner, wouldn’t she be back afore this, ma’am?”

“I suppose they’ve gone to some place of amusement,” said Mrs. Hurtle.

“Like enough,” said John Crumb in a low voice.

“She’s that mad after dancing as never was,” said Mrs. Pipkin.

“And where is it as ’em dances?” asked Crumb, getting up from his chair, and stretching himself. It was evident to both the ladies that he was beginning to think that he would follow Ruby to the music hall. Neither of them answered him, however, and then he sat down again. “Does ’em dance all night at them places, Mrs. Pipkin?”

“They do pretty nearly all that they oughtn’t to do,” said Mrs. Pipkin. John Crumb raised one of his fists, brought it down heavily on the palm of his other hand, and then again sat silent for awhile.

“I never knowed as she was fond o’ dancing,” he said. “I’d a had dancing for her down at Bungay⁠—just as ready as anything. D’ye think, ma’am, it’s the dancing she’s after, or the baro-nite?” This was another appeal to Mrs. Hurtle.

“I