第19章

The next day I went and took my place at the third clerk's desk, being led to it by Mr.B., who made a speech to the gents, much to the annoyance of the other chaps, who grumbled about their services: though, as for the matter of that, our services were very much alike: the Company was only three years old, and the oldest clerk in it had not six months' more standing in it than I."Look out," said that envious M'Whirter to me."Have you got money, or have any of your relations money? or are any of them going to put it into the concern?"I did not think fit to answer him, but took a pinch out of his mull, and was always kind to him; and he, to say the truth, was always most civil to me.As for Gus Hoskins, he began to think I was a superior being; and I must say that the rest of the chaps behaved very kindly in the matter, and said that if one man were to be put over their heads before another, theywould have pitched upon me, for I had never harmed any of them, and done little kindnesses to several.

"I know," says Abednego, "how you got the place.It was I who got it you.I told Brough you were a cousin of Preston's, the Lord of the Treasury, had venison from him and all that; and depend upon it he expects that you will be able to do him some good in that quarter."I think there was some likelihood in what Abednego said, because our governor, as we called him, frequently spoke to me about my cousin; told me to push the concern in the West End of the town, get as many noblemen as we could to insure with us, and so on.It was in vain I said I could do nothing with Mr.Preston."Bah! bah!" says Mr.Brough, "don't tell ME.People don't send haunches of venison to you for nothing;" and I'm convinced he thought I was a very cautious prudent fellow, for not bragging about my great family, and keeping my connection with them a secret.To be sure he might have learned the truth from Gus, who lived with me; but Gus would insist that I was hand in glove with all the nobility, and boasted about me ten times as much as I did myself.

The chaps used to call me the "West Ender.""See," thought I, "what I have gained by Aunt Hoggarty giving me a diamond-pin! What a lucky thing it is that she did not give me the money, as I hoped she would! Had I not had the pin--had I even taken it to any other person but Mr.Polonius, Lady Drum would never have noticed me; had Lady Drum never noticed me, Mr.Brough never would, and I never should have been third clerk of the West Diddlesex."I took heart at all this, and wrote off on the very evening of my appointment to my dearest Mary Smith, giving her warning that a "certain event," for which one of us was longing very earnestly, might come off sooner than we had expected.And why not? Miss S.'s own fortune was 70L.a year, mine was 150L., and when we had 300L., we always vowed we would marry."Ah!" thought I, "if I could but go to Somersetshire now, I might boldly walk up to old Smith's door" (he was her grandfather, and a half-pay lieutenant of the navy), "I might knock at the knocker and see my beloved Mary in the parlour, and not be obliged to sneak behind hayricks on the look-out for her, or pelt stones at midnight at her window."My aunt, in a few days, wrote a pretty gracious reply to my letter.She had not determined, she said, as to the manner in which she should employ her three thousand pounds, but should take my offer into consideration; begging me to keep my shares open for a little while, until her mind was made up.

What, then, does Mr.Brough do? I learned afterwards, in the year 1830, when he and the West Diddlesex Association had disappeared altogether, how he had proceeded.

"Who are the attorneys at Slopperton?" says he to me in a careless way.