The Heroine. Barrett Eaton Stannard
I frowned so, you can't think; and I am sure, I never remembered to look at the money since; and this is the whole truth, I pledge you my credit and honour, and by the immaculate Wenus, as the gentlemen say.'
The accusing witness who insulted the magistrate's bench with the oath, leered as she gave it in; and the recording clerk, as he wrote it down, drew a line under the words, and pointed them out for ever.
'Then you saw the three notches?' said I.
'As plain as I see you now,' replied she, 'and a guilty poor thing you look.'
'And yet,' said I, 'if his Excellenza examines, he will find that there is not a single notch in any one of the coins.'
''Tis the case indeed,' said the magistrate, after looking at them.
He then questioned both of us more minutely, and turning to me, said, 'Your conduct, young woman, is unaccountable: but as your accuser has certainly belied herself, she has probably belied you. The money, by her own account, cannot be her's, but as it was found in your possession, it may be your's. I therefore feel fully justified in restoring it to you, and in acquitting you of the crime laid to your charge.'
Jerry Sullivan uttered a shout of joy. I received the purse with silent dignity, gave Maria back her sixpence, and hurried out of the room.
Jerry followed me.
'Why then,' cried he, shaking me heartily by the hand, as we walked along, 'only tell me how I can serve you, and 'tis I am the man that will do it; though, to be sure, you must be the greatest little scapegrace (bless your heart!) in the three kingdoms.'
'Alas!' said I, 'you mistake my character. I am heiress to an immense territory, and a heroine – the proudest title that can adorn a woman.'
'I never heard of that title before,' said Jerry, 'but I warrant 'tis no better than it should be.'
'You shall judge for yourself,' said I. 'A heroine is a young lady, rather taller than usual, and often an orphan; at all events, possessed of the finest eyes in the world. Though her frame is so fragile, that a breath of wind might scatter it like chaff, it is sometimes stouter than a statue of cast iron. She blushes to the tips of her fingers, and when other girls would laugh, she faints. Besides, she has tears, sighs, and half sighs, at command; lives a month on a mouthful, and is addicted to the pale consumption.'
'Why then, much good may it do her,' cried Jerry; 'but in my mind, a phthisicky girl is no great treasure; and as for the fashion of living a month on a mouthful, let me have a potatoe and chop for my dinner, and a herring on Saturday nights, and I would not give a farthing for all the starvation you could offer me. So when I finish my bit of herring, my wife says to me, winking, a fish loves water, says she, and immediately she fetches me a dram.'
'These are the delights of vulgar life,' said I. 'But to be thin, innocent, and lyrical; to bind and unbind her hair; in a word, to be the most miserable creature that ever augmented a brook with tears, these, my friend, are the glories of a heroine.'
'Famous glories, by dad!' cried Jerry; 'but as I am a poor man, and not particular, I can contrive to make shift with health and happiness, and to rub through life without binding my hair. – Bind it? by the powers, 'tis seldom I even comb it.'
As I was all this time without my bonnet (for in my hurry from Betterton's I had left it behind me), I determined to purchase one. So I went into a shop, with Jerry, and asked the woman of it for an interesting and melancholy turn of bonnet.
She looked at me with some surprise, but produced several; and I fixed on one which resembled a bonnet that I had once seen in a picture of a wood nymph. So I put it on me, wished the woman good morning, and was walking away.
'You have forgotten to pay me, Miss,' said she.
'True,' replied I, 'but 'tis no great matter. Adieu.'
'You shall pay me, however,' cried she, ringing a bell, and a man entered instantly from an inner room.
'Here is a hussey,' exclaimed she, 'who refuses to pay me for a bonnet.'
'My sweet friend,' said I to her, 'a distressed heroine, which I am, I assure you, runs in debt every where. Besides, as I like your face, I mean to implicate you in my plot, and make you one of the dramatis personæ in the history of my life. Probably you will turn out to be my mother's nurse's daughter. At all events, I give you my word, I will pay you at the denouement, when the other characters come to be provided for; and meantime, to secure your acquaintance, I must insist on owing you money.'
'By dad,' said Jerry, 'that is the first of all ways to lose an acquaintance.'
'The bonnet or the money!' cried the man, stepping between me and the door.
'Neither the one nor the other,' answered I. 'No, Sir, to run in debt is part of my plan, and by what right dare you interfere to save me from ruin? Pretty, indeed, that a girl at my time of life cannot select her own misfortunes! Sir, your conduct astonishes, shocks, disgusts me.'
To such a reasonable appeal the man could not reply, so he snatched at my bonnet. Jerry jumped forward, and arrested his arm.
'Hands off, bully!' cried the shopman.
'No, in troth,' said Jerry; 'and the more you bid me, the more I won't let you go. If her ladyship has set her heart on a robbery, I am not the man to balk her fancy. Sure, did not she save me from a gaol? And sure, would not I help her to a bonnet? A bonnet? 'Pon my conscience, she shall have half a dozen. 'Tis I that would not much mind being hanged for her!'
So saying, he snatched a parcel of bonnets from the counter, and was instantly knocked down by the shopman. He rose, and both began a furious conflict. In the midst of it, I was attempting to rush from the shop, when I found my spangled muslin barbarously seized by the woman, who tore it to pieces in the struggle; and pulling off the bonnet, gave me a horrid slap in the face. I would have cuffed her nicely in return, only that she was more than my match; but I stamped at her with my feet. At first I was shocked at having made this unheroic gesture; till I luckily recollected, that Amanda once stamped at an amorous footman.
Meantime Jerry had stunned his adversary with a blow; so taking this opportunity of escape, he dragged me with him from the shop, and hurried me through several streets, without uttering a word.
At length I was so much exhausted, that we stopped; and strange figures we were: Jerry's face smeared with blood, nothing on my head, my long hair hanging loose about me, and my poor spangled muslin all in rags.
'Here,' said Jerry to an old woman who was selling apples at the corner of the street, 'take care of this young body, while I fetch her a coach.' And off he ran.
The woman looked at me with a suspicious eye, so I resolved to gain her good opinion. It struck me that I might extract pathos from an apple, and taking one from her stall, 'An apple, my charming old friend,' said I, 'is the symbol of discord. Eve lost Paradise by tasting it, Paris exasperated Juno by throwing it.' – A loud burst of laughter made me turn round, and I perceived a crowd already at my elbow.
'Who tore her gown?' said one.
'Ask her spangles,' said another.
'Or her hair,' cried a third.
''Tis long enough to hang her,' cried a fourth.
'The king's hemp will do that job for her,' added a fifth.
A pull at my muslin assailed me on the one side, and when I turned about, my hair was thrown over my face on the other.
'Good people,' said I, 'you know not whom you thus insult. I am descended from illustrious, and perhaps Italian parents – '
A butcher's boy advanced, and putting half a hat under his arm; 'Will your ladyship,' said he, 'permit me to hand you into that there shop?'
I bowed assent, and he led me, nothing loath. Peals of laughter followed us.
'Now,' said I, as I stood at the door, 'I will reward your gallantry with half a guinea.'
As I drew forth my money, I saw his face reddening, his cheeks swelling, and his mouth pursing up.
'What delicate sensibility!' said I, 'but positively you must not refuse this