a great actress, and make your fortune, and marry a lord,—lords go out of their wits for great actresses,—whereas, with him, what will you do? drudge and rot and starve; and he can’t live long, and then where will you be? ‘T is a shame to hold her so, you idle old vagabond.”
“I don’t hold her,” said Waife, trying to push her away. “There’s something in what the man says. Choose for yourself, Sophy.”
SOPHY (suppressing a sob).—“How can you have the heart to talk so, Grandy? I tell you, Mr. Rugge, you are a bad man, and I hate you, and all about you; and I’ll stay with Grandfather; and I don’t care if I do starve: he sha’n’t!”
MR. RUGGE (clapping both hands on the crown of his hat, and striding to the door).—“William Waife, beware ‘t is done. I’m your enemy. As for you, too dear but abandoned infant, stay with him: you’ll find out very soon who and what he is; your pride will have a fall, when—”
Waife sprang forward, despite his lameness,—both his fists clenched, his one eye ablaze; his broad burly torso confronted and daunted the stormy manager. Taller and younger though Rugge was, he cowered before the cripple he had so long taunted and humbled. The words stood arrested on his tongue. “Leave the room instantly!” thundered the actor, in a voice no longer broken. “Blacken my name before that child by one word, and I will dash the next down your throat.” Rugge rushed to the door, and keeping it ajar between Waife and himself, he then thrust in his head, hissing forth,
“Fly, caitiff, fly! my revenge shall track your secret and place you in my power. Juliet Araminta shall yet be mine.” With these awful words the Remorseless Baron cleared the stairs in two bounds, and was out of the house.
Waife smiled contemptuously. But as the street-door clanged on the form of the angry manager, the colour faded from the old man’s face. Exhausted by the excitement he had gone through, he sank on a chair, and, with one quick gasp as for breath, fainted away.
CHAPTER XI
Progress of the Fine Arts.—Biographical anecdotes.—Fluctuations in the value of money.—Speculative tendencies of the time.
Whatever the shock which the brutality of the Remorseless Baron inflicted on the nervous system of the persecuted but triumphant Bandit, it had certainly subsided by the time Vance and Lionel entered Waife’s apartment; for they found grandfather and grandchild seated near the open window, at the corner of the table (on which they had made room for their operations by the removal of the carved cocoanut, the crystal egg, and the two flower-pots), eagerly engaged, with many a silvery laugh from the lips of Sophy, in the game of dominos.
Mr. Waife had been devoting himself, for the last hour and more, to the instruction of Sophy in the mysteries of that intellectual amusement; and such pains did he take, and so impressive were his exhortations, that his happy pupil could not help thinking to herself that this was the new art upon which Waife depended for their future livelihood. She sprang up, however, at the entrance of the visitors, her face beaming with grateful smiles; and, running to Lionel and taking him by the hand, while she courtesied with more respect to Vance, she exclaimed, “We are free! thanks to you, thanks to you both! He is gone! Mr. Rugge is gone!”
“So I saw on passing the green; stage and all,” said Vance, while Lionel kissed the child and pressed her to his side. It is astonishing how paternal he felt,—how much she had crept into his heart.
“Pray, sir,” asked Sophy, timidly, glancing to Vance, “has the Norfolk Giant gone too?”
VANCE.—“I fancy so—all the shows were either gone or going.”
SOPHY.—“The Calf with Two Heads?”
VANCE.—“Do you regret it?”
SOPHY.—“Oh, dear, no.”
Waife, who after a profound bow, and a cheery “Good day, gentlemen,” had hitherto remained silent, putting away the dominoes, now said, “I suppose, sir, you would like at once to begin your sketch?”
VANCE.—“Yes; I have brought all my tools; see, even the canvas. I wish it were larger, but it is all I have with me of that material: ‘t is already stretched; just let me arrange the light.”
WAIFE.—“If you don’t want me, gentlemen, I will take the air for half-an-hour or so. In fact, I may now feel free to look after my investment.”
SOPHY (whispering Lionel).—“You are sure the Calf has gone as well as the Norfolk Giant?”
Lionel wonderingly replied that he thought so; and Waife disappeared into his room, whence he soon emerged, having doffed his dressing-gown for a black coat, by no means threadbare, and well brushed. Hat, stick, and gloves in hand, he really seemed respectable,—more than respectable,—Gentleman Waife every inch of him; and saying, “Look your best, Sophy, and sit still, if you can,” nodded pleasantly to the three, and hobbled down the stairs. Sophy—whom Vance had just settled into a chair, with her head bent partially down (three-quarters), as the artist had released
“The loose train of her amber-dropping hair,”
and was contemplating aspect and position with a painter’s meditative eye-started up, to his great discomposure, and rushed to the window. She returned to her seat with her mind much relieved. Waife was walking in an opposite direction to that which led towards the whilolm quarters of the Norfolk Giant and the Two-headed Calf.
“Come, come,” said Vance, impatiently, “you have broken an idea in half. I beg you will not stir till I have placed you; and then, if all else of you be still, you may exercise your tongue. I give you leave to talk.”
SOPHY (penitentially).—“I am so sorry—I beg pardon. Will that do, sir?”
VANCE.—“Head a little more to the right,—so, Titania watching Bottom asleep. Will you lie on the floor, Lionel, and do Bottom?”
LIONEL (indignantly).—“Bottom! Have I an ass’s head?”
VANCE.—“Immaterial! I can easily imagine that you have one. I want merely an outline of figure,—something sprawling and ungainly.”
LIONEL (sulkily).—“Much obliged to you; imagine that too.”
VANCE.—“Don’t be so disobliging. It is necessary that she should look fondly at something,—expression in the eye.” Lionel at once reclined himself incumbent in a position as little sprawling and ungainly as he could well contrive.
VANCE.—“Fancy, Miss Sophy, that this young gentleman is very dear to you. Have you got a brother?”
SOPHY.—“Ah, no, sir.”
VANCE.—“Hum. But you have, or have had, a doll?”
SOPHY.—“Oh, yes; Grandfather gave me one.”
VANCE.—“And you were fond of that doll?”
SOPHY.—“Very.”
VANCE.—“Fancy that young gentleman is your doll grown big, that it is asleep, and you are watching that no one hurts it; Mr. Rugge, for instance. Throw your whole soul into that thought,—love for doll, apprehension of Rugge. Lionel, keep still, and shut your eyes; do.”
LIONEL (grumbling).—“I did not come here to be made a doll of.”
VANCE.—“Coax him to be quiet, Miss Sophy, and sleep peaceably, or I shall do him a mischief. I can be a Rugge, too, if I am put out.”
SOPHY (in the softest tones).—“Do try and sleep, sir: shall I get you a pillow?”
LIONEL.—“No, thank you: I’m very comfortable now,” settling his head upon his arm; and after one upward glance towards Sophy, the