Chapter VII (3)

"My dear fellow, I'm going out--a particular engagement--been kept in all the morning;--will Friday do? Or shall I see you at the club?" No--nothing will do but listening; and your pertinacious and not-to-be-denied detainer has just settled himself in the easiest chair, and commenced his story with, "Now, come sit down, and I'll tell you all about it."--when the knocker once more summons the half-tired Tim, who forthwith enters with a proclamation in an under-tone, "Mr. Drone, sir, comes by appointment."

Luckily this occasions no difficulty. Mr. Drone was appointed to come at eleven, and it is now half-past two; he is therefore easily dismissed; besides, appointments, in these cases, are never troublesome; you can always be very sorry at a minute's notice, be particularly engaged very unexpectedly, and appoint another hour and another day with perfect convenience.--No, it is the dropper-in who blocks up your way--it is the idler who interrupts you in your expedition;--the man of business who comes by appointment may generally be despatched without ceremony or delay!

You return again to your guest with a disconsolate air, though with a desperate determination to look attentive; but _sit_ you will not; for while you keep poking the fire almost out, you seem to be preparing for your exit; and while you saunter listlessly about the room, you seem to be going; till at last you are brought to a stand-still, and compelled to submit to another bit of delay, by your visitor (who dined out, and staid late somewhere the night before) asking for a glass of sherry, and some soda-water! You hurry to the bell with the happiest grace in the world; you are ashamed of not offering something of the sort before; you beg pardon--really; and taking a seat with a smiling countenance and a heavy heart, bid a mournful adieu to every thought about your hat for the next quarter of an hour at least.

At last he does go, and you feel that although the cream of the morning is skimmed off, it may still be worth while to take quietly what remains; you may visit the scene of your broken engagement, though too late; you may enjoy a diminished stroll, although the flower of the day is cropped; and in this spirit, cane in hand, and hat actually on head, you advance to the street-door delivered from every visitor. It is opened--you stand in the very door-way;--and then--then, in that moment of liberty, when you seemed free as air--you behold close to the step, and right in your path, another unconscionable acquaintance who never takes a denial, but always seizes a button instead! To retreat is impossible, to pass him unseen is equally so. Your hope of going out dies of old age and ill-usage within you--you can't _get_ out. Your start of vexation and dismay is involuntary, and not to be concealed; but what cares he for your disappointment, so that he catches you! "Well, now I _am_ lucky," he exclaims, "one moment more, and, presto! I had missed you for the morning! Come, 'going out,' is not 'gone,' anyhow--so I must just trouble you to turn back--I shan't keep you long!"

Of course, you explain, and protest, and are very civil and very sorry; but all this is idle. A visitor of the class to which the new-comer belongs knows very well the advantage he has over you. He smiles triumphantly, in a superb consciousness of your helpless and destitute condition. He is aware that you _can't_ shut the door in his face; that if he persists in going in, under the pretence of a moment's interview, you _must_ go in with him; that you are bound to be glad to see him, or stand exposed to the imputation of rudeness and inhospitality; that he may let you off if he likes, but that you cannot decently bolt without his consent; in short, that you are at his mercy--and this conviction teaches him to have no mercy upon you.

The result! who can ask it? You turn back, take off your hat, enter the nearest room, and without the slightest movement of hospitality beyond that--without the slightest hint to the remorseless being who has followed you in that there is such a thing as a chair in the room, you rest the fingers of one hand on the table, and with your hat held resolutely in the other, await your tyrant's pleasure. _He!_--powers of impudence in the garb of intimacy, where will ye find a limit? He, the most domesticated of animals, at once finds himself in his own house. He, when his foremost foot has once gained admittance into your sanctum, feels perfectly and entirely at home. He flings himself into a chair, and after a little parley about the weather (he acknowledges that it has been the loveliest morning of the season), and the glorious effects of exercise (he confesses that nothing on earth prevents him from taking his diurnal round in the bracing period of the day), launches boldly into a dissertation on some subject of immediate interest to himself--connected perhaps with municipal institutions, and the risk he incurs if he should decline to serve the office of sheriff; this suggests to him a recollection of the sheriff, his grandfather, whose history he relates at some length, followed by a narrative of his father's remarkable exploits in the whale-trade, and of his own life down to the period of his second marriage.

During all this time you have stood, too tired to interrupt--too polite at least to interrupt to any purpose--until at last, reminded by the shade creeping over the apartment that the beauty of the day is vanishing, that your meditated excursion is all but hopeless, and that you have been for the space of a brilliant summer's morning a prisoner in your own house, you savagely endeavour to bring him to the point. What _does_ he want with you? Nothing; nothing of course, except a little rest after the pleasant saunter he has had--and a little refreshment also;--for when he looks at his watch (as you fondly suppose with the intention of going) he discovers that it happens to be his hour for "a snack." In short, this inveterate and uncompromising customer forcibly _has the tray up_; you haven't strength or courage to misunderstand his wishes, feeling rather faint yourself, sick of hope deferred, and inclining to potted beef. You place your hat and stick, both of which you have all this time held, upon the table; you draw off one glove; you fall-to with a famished fiend who has walked twice round the Park in the bracing air; and another hour is gone.

So at length is he! And now, even now the promised stroll may be seized--the coast is clear--you feel "like a giant refreshed," and after all, you cannot help owning, that it's a horribly vulgar thing to be seen strolling about before four o'clock in the day. You remember what the delicate philosopher said about the world not being properly aired before three; and bless your stars that what you have lost in health you have gained in reputation. On go your gloves once more, and--rap goes the knocker! It seems miraculous. All society is but one spiteful conspiracy against you. You forget that the same fine morning which quickened life in you kindled the fire of motion in others. No matter; the hour has at length arrived for "not at home to any human being. No, Tim, not to a living soul!" Unluckily, it is the fate of this most inflexible decree to be countermanded; there is one exception to the rule of not at home to anybody. "If the surveyor calls about the repairs"--ay, and it _is_ the surveyor. Well, the roof, and the cracked wall, must at once be looked to; however, that will not occupy ten minutes, and to the needful business you heroically devote yourself. Half-an-hour flies, and then you are finally released; but, unhappily, just at that moment the man brings home your two new coats; you must glance at one, for you may wear it at dinner. And then crawls up to the door that dilatory fellow whose tidings about the books you have been waiting for--yes, at least for a fortnight; and while discussing with him a particular achievement in binding on which you have set your heart, a letter arrives--a letter marked "important and immediate," though of no earthly consequence, and anything but pressing; still it must be answered, and accordingly the hat is once more taken off, the gloves are petulantly flung down, the cane is tossed anywhere, and--

Rat-tat-tat, &c. resound once more through the rooms; and following quick as though he were the visible echo of a single rap, Cool Sam comes in. He had found Tim at the open door chatting with the messenger in waiting. Cool Sam! Now own frankly that there is small chance of your escape on this side the dinner-hour--nay, there is none at all. An engagement you may have, a determination you may have formed; but do you for a single instant seriously expect to fulfil the one, or hold to the other? Then you are a fool. We prophesy at once, that _you won't get out to-day_. A man may be always going and going, and yet never be gone. You are Sam's till dinner-time, you are Sam's then, and you are Sam's afterwards. Till bed-time (and he himself fixes that hour) you are his. Mark our words if you are not. True, you tell him you have to write a letter. "Write away, boy," he responds, "I can wait." You warn him that the moment this feat is accomplished, you must sally forth on urgent and especial business. "All right," he rejoins, "I'll jump into a cab with you, and we'll come back and dine. I came on purpose."

A glance tells you, if your ears did not, that your guest has settled the thing. His looks, his tone, his bearing, are in exquisite agreement; for a quiet conviction, that what _he_ has made up his mind to _must_ take place, there never was anything like it. You write a word or two, and in agitation blot; another line, and then an erasure again. _Does_ he mean to _stop_! Your perplexity increases. No, this smudge of a note will never do; you take another sheet and recommence your epistle. "Take your time, boy, take your time; we shan't dine till seven I suppose." Your eye wanders for an instant, and you discover that there is but _one_ hat in the room, and that the one is your own. His is hanging up with his umbrella; he had disposed of both, like a man who means to stay, before he entered the apartment.

To struggle with Cool Sam is in vain, to attempt it absurd. To cry like the starling, "I can't get out," doesn't open the door of your cage. Instead of complaining, you soon feel grateful to him for his great consideration in allowing you to finish that letter. Instead of biting your lips through and through, you laugh over your good luck in being permitted to complete the work he had interrupted. But beyond that you have no will of your own. _Out!_ You might as well attempt to go out without your shadow. You may take a few turns at sunset, attended by your Mephistophiles; but before you go you must issue orders for what he calls "a light dinner with a few extras" at seven. You may mourn your day lost, if you will, but you must lose your evening nevertheless; and when once more alone at past midnight, you drop off to sleep, making to yourself many delicious vows of reform; the foremost of which is, that you will be up in good time in the morning, AND GET OUT.

FRANK HEARTWELL; OR, FIFTY YEARS AGO.

BY BOWMAN TILLER.