Memoirs of Joseph Grimaldi. Grimaldi Joseph
if you only knew how much I have suffered since last night!" Here she paused for some moments, and added, with some violence of tone and manner, that if that suspense lasted much longer, she should go mad.
"Hey-day! Miss Maria," exclaimed Mrs. Lewis—"mad! Why, surely you cannot have been so imprudent as to have formed an attachment to Joe yourself? But you shall see the letter, as you wish it; there is only one thing you must promise, and that is, to plead Joe's cause with the lady herself."
Miss Hughes hesitated, faltered, and at length said, she would try.
At this point of the discourse, Mrs. Lewis produced the laboured composition, and placed it in her hand.
Miss Hughes raised the letter, glanced at the direction, saw her own name written as plainly as the nervous fingers of its agitated writer would permit, let it fall to the ground, and sunk into the arms of Mrs. Lewis.
While this scene was acting in a private room, Grimaldi was acting upon the public stage; and conscious that his hopes depended upon his exertions, he did not suffer his anxieties, great as they were, to interfere with his performance. Towards the conclusion of the first piece he heard somebody enter Mr. Hughes's box—and there sat the object of all his anxiety.
"She has got the letter," thought the trembling actor; "she must have decided by this time."
He would have given all he possessed to have known what had passed—when the business of the stage calling him to the front, exactly facing the box in which she sat, their eyes met, and she nodded and smiled. This was not the first time that Miss Hughes had nodded and smiled to Joseph Grimaldi, but it threw him into a state of confusion and agitation which at once deprived him of all consciousness of what he was about. He never heard that he did not finish the scene in which he was engaged at the moment, and he always supposed, in consequence, that he did so: but how, or in what manner, he never could imagine, not having the slightest recollection of anything that passed.
It is singular enough that throughout the whole of Grimaldi's existence, which was a chequered one enough, even at those years when other children are kept in the cradle or the nursery, there always seemed some odd connexion between his good and bad fortune; no great pleasure appeared to come to him unaccompanied by some accident or mischance: he mentions the fact more than once, and lays great stress upon it.
On this very night, a heavy platform, on which ten men were standing, broke down, and fell upon him as he stood underneath; a severe contusion of the shoulder was the consequence, and he was carried home immediately. Remedies were applied without loss of time, but he suffered intense pain all night; it gradually abated towards morning, in consequence of the inestimable virtues of a certain embrocation, which he always kept ready in case of such accidents, and which was prepared from a recipe left him by his father, which, having performed a great many cures, he afterwards gave to one Mr. Chamberlaine, a surgeon of Clerkenwell, who christened it, in acknowledgment, "Grimaldi's Embrocation," and used it in his general practice some years with perfect success. Before he was carried from the theatre, however, he had had the presence of mind to beg Mrs. Lewis to be called to him, and to request her to communicate the nature of the accident to Miss Hughes (who had quitted the box before it occurred) as cautiously as she could. This, Mrs. Lewis, who appears to have been admirably qualified for the task in which she was engaged, and to possess quite a diplomatic relish for negotiation, undertook and performed.
There is no need to lengthen this part of his history, which, however interesting, and most honourably so, to the old man himself, who in the last days of his life looked back with undiminished interest and affection to the early time when he first became acquainted with the excellence of a lady, to whom he was tenderly attached, and whose affection he never forgot or trifled with, would possess but few attractions for the general reader. The main result is quickly told: he was lying on a sofa next day, with his arm in a sling, when Miss Hughes visited him, and did not affect to disguise her solicitude for his recovery; and, in short, by returning his affection, made him the happiest man, or rather boy (for he was not yet quite sixteen), in the world.
There was only one thing that damped his joy, and this was, Miss Hughes's firm and steadfast refusal to continue any correspondence or communication with him unknown to her parents. Nor is it unnatural that this announcement should have occasioned him some uneasiness, when their relative situations in life are taken into consideration; Mr. Hughes being a man of considerable property, and Grimaldi entirely dependent on his own exertions for support.
He made use of every persuasion in his power to induce the young lady to alter her determination; he failed to effect anything beyond the compromise, that for the present she would only mention their attachment to her mother, upon whose kindness and secrecy she was certain she could rely. This was done, and Mrs. Hughes, finding that her daughter's happiness depended on her decision, offered no opposition, merely remarking that their extreme youth forbade all idea of marriage at that time. Three years elapsed before Mr. Hughes was made acquainted with the secret.
After this, his time passed away happily enough; he saw Miss Hughes every evening in his mother's presence, and every Sunday she spent with them. All this time his reputation was rapidly increasing; almost every new part he played rendered him a greater favourite than before, and altogether his lot in life was a cheerful and contented one.
At this period, the only inhabitants of the house in Penton-place were Grimaldi and his mother, and Mrs. Lewis, of whom honourable mention has been so often made in the present chapter, together with her husband; there was no servant in the house; a girl that had lived with them some time having gone into the country to see her friends, and no other having been engaged in her absence.
One night in the middle of August, a "night rehearsal" was called at Sadler's Wells. For the information of those who are unacquainted with theatrical matters, it may be well to state that a "night rehearsal" takes place after the other performances of the evening are over, and the public have left the house. Being an inconvenient and fatiguing ceremony, it is never resorted to, but when some very heavy piece (that is, one on a very extensive scale) is to be produced on a short notice. In this instance a new piece was to be played on the following Monday, of which the performers knew very little, and there being no time to lose, a "night rehearsal" was called, the natural consequence of which would be the detention of the company at the theatre until four o'clock in the morning at least. Mr. Lewis, having notice of the rehearsal in common with the other performers, locked up their dwelling-house, being the last person who left it; brought the street-door key with him, and handed it over to Mr. Grimaldi.
But after the performances were over, which was shortly after eleven o'clock, when the curtain was raised, and the performers, assembling on the stage, prepared to commence the rehearsal, the stage-manager addressed the company in the following unexpected and very agreeable terms:—
"Ladies and Gentlemen, as the new drama will not be produced, as was originally intended, on Monday next, but is deferred until that night week, we shall not be compelled to trouble you with a rehearsal to-night."
This notification occasioned a very quick dispersion of the performers, who, very unexpectedly released from an onerous attendance, hurried home. Grimaldi, having something to do at the theatre which would occupy him about ten minutes, sent his mother and his friend Mrs. Lewis forward to prepare supper, and followed them shortly afterwards, accompanied by Mr. Lewis and two other performers attached to the theatre.
When the females reached home they found to their great surprise that the garden gate was open.
"Dear me!" said Mrs. Grimaldi,[19] "how careless this is of Mr. Lewis!"
[19] Mrs. Brooker.
It was, undoubtedly; for at that time a most notorious gang of thieves infested that suburb of London;—it was a suburb then. Several of the boldest had been hung, and others transported, but these punishments had no effect upon their more lucky companions, who committed their depredations with, if possible, increased hardihood and daring.
They were not a little surprised, after crossing the