disputed it, she would be instantly taken up and transported.) When his ring at the gate-bell is expected, or takes place, every young lady who can, under any pretence, look out of window, looks out of window; while every young lady who is ‘practising,’ practises out of time; and the French class becomes so demoralised that the mark goes round as briskly as the bottle at a convivial party in the last century.
On the afternoon of the day next after the dinner of two at the gatehouse, the bell is rung with the usual fluttering results.
‘Mr. Edwin Drood to see Miss Rosa.’
This is the announcement of the parlour-maid in chief. Miss Twinkleton, with an exemplary air of melancholy on her, turns to the sacrifice, and says, ‘You may go down, my dear.’ Miss Bud goes down, followed by all eyes.
Mr. Edwin Drood is waiting in Miss Twinkleton’s own parlour: a dainty room, with nothing more directly scholastic in it than a terrestrial and a celestial globe. These expressive machines imply (to parents and guardians) that even when Miss Twinkleton retires into the bosom of privacy, duty may at any moment compel her to become a sort of Wandering Jewess, scouring the earth and soaring through the skies in search of knowledge for her pupils.
The last new maid, who has never seen the young gentleman Miss Rosa is engaged to, and who is making his acquaintance between the hinges of the open door, left open for the purpose, stumbles guiltily down the kitchen stairs, as a charming little apparition, with its face concealed by a little silk apron thrown over its head, glides into the parlour.
‘O! it is so ridiculous!’ says the apparition, stopping and shrinking. ‘Don’t, Eddy!’
‘Don’t what, Rosa?’
‘Don’t come any nearer, please. It is so absurd.’
‘What is absurd, Rosa?’
‘The whole thing is. It is so absurd to be an engaged orphan and it is so absurd to have the girls and the servants scuttling about after one, like mice in the wainscot; and it is so absurd to be called upon!’
The apparition appears to have a thumb in the corner of its mouth while making this complaint.
‘You give me an affectionate reception, Pussy, I must say.’
‘Well, I will in a minute, Eddy, but I can’t just yet. How are you?’ (very shortly.)
‘I am unable to reply that I am much the better for seeing you, Pussy, inasmuch as I see nothing of you.’
This second remonstrance brings a dark, bright, pouting eye out from a corner of the apron; but it swiftly becomes invisible again, as the apparition exclaims: ‘O good gracious! you have had half your hair cut off!’
‘I should have done better to have had my head cut off, I think,’ says Edwin, rumpling the hair in question, with a fierce glance at the looking-glass, and giving an impatient stamp. ‘Shall I go?’
‘No; you needn’t go just yet, Eddy. The girls would all be asking questions why you went.’
‘Once for all, Rosa, will you uncover that ridiculous little head of yours and give me a welcome?’
The apron is pulled off the childish head, as its wearer replies: ‘You’re very welcome, Eddy. There! I’m sure that’s nice. Shake hands. No, I can’t kiss you, because I’ve got an acidulated drop in my mouth.’
‘Are you at all glad to see me, Pussy?’
‘O, yes, I’m dreadfully glad. – Go and sit down. – Miss Twinkleton.’
It is the custom of that excellent lady when these visits occur, to appear every three minutes, either in her own person or in that of Mrs. Tisher, and lay an offering on the shrine of Propriety by affecting to look for some desiderated article. On the present occasion Miss Twinkleton, gracefully gliding in and out, says in passing: ‘How do you do, Mr. Drood? Very glad indeed to have the pleasure. Pray excuse me. Tweezers. Thank you!’
‘I got the gloves last evening, Eddy, and I like them very much. They are beauties.’
‘Well, that’s something,’ the affianced replies, half grumbling. ‘The smallest encouragement thankfully received. And how did you pass your birthday, Pussy?’
‘Delightfully! Everybody gave me a present. And we had a feast. And we had a ball at night.’
‘A feast and a ball, eh? These occasions seem to go off tolerably well without me, Pussy.’
‘De-lightfully!’ cries Rosa, in a quite spontaneous manner, and without the least pretence of reserve.
‘Hah! And what was the feast?’
‘Tarts, oranges, jellies, and shrimps.’
‘Any partners at the ball?’
‘We danced with one another, of course, sir. But some of the girls made game to be their brothers. It was so droll!’
‘Did anybody make game to be – ’
‘To be you? O dear yes!’ cries Rosa, laughing with great enjoyment. ‘That was the first thing done.’
‘I hope she did it pretty well,’ says Edwin rather doubtfully.
‘O, it was excellent! – I wouldn’t dance with you, you know.’
Edwin scarcely seems to see the force of this; begs to know if he may take the liberty to ask why?
‘Because I was so tired of you,’ returns Rosa. But she quickly adds, and pleadingly too, seeing displeasure in his face: ‘Dear Eddy, you were just as tired of me, you know.’
‘Did I say so, Rosa?’
‘Say so! Do you ever say so? No, you only showed it. O, she did it so well!’ cries Rosa, in a sudden ecstasy with her counterfeit betrothed.
‘It strikes me that she must be a devilish impudent girl,’ says Edwin Drood. ‘And so, Pussy, you have passed your last birthday in this old house.’
‘Ah, yes!’ Rosa clasps her hands, looks down with a sigh, and shakes her head.
‘You seem to be sorry, Rosa.’
‘I am sorry for the poor old place. Somehow, I feel as if it would miss me, when I am gone so far away, so young.’
‘Perhaps we had better stop short, Rosa?’
She looks up at him with a swift bright look; next moment shakes her head, sighs, and looks down again.
‘That is to say, is it, Pussy, that we are both resigned?’
She nods her head again, and after a short silence, quaintly bursts out with: ‘You know we must be married, and married from here, Eddy, or the poor girls will be so dreadfully disappointed!’
For the moment there is more of compassion, both for her and for himself, in her affianced husband’s face, than there is of love. He checks the look, and asks: ‘Shall I take you out for a walk, Rosa dear?’
Rosa dear does not seem at all clear on this point, until her face, which has been comically
