CHAPTER X.
Showing the causes why men and nations, when one man or nation
wishes to get for its own arbitrary purposes what the other man or
nation does not desire to part with, are apt to ignore the mild
precepts of Christianity, shock the sentiments and upset the
theories of Peace Societies.
"Am I to understand," said Mr. Rugge, in a whisper, when Waife had drawn
him to the farthest end of the inner room, with the bed-curtains between
their position and the door, deadening the sound of their voices,--"am I
to understand that, after my taking you and that child to my theatre out
of charity, and at your own request, you are going to quit me without
warning,--French leave; is that British conduct?"
"Mr. Rugge," replied Waife, deprecatingly, "I have no engagement with you
beyond an experimental trial. We were free on both sides for three
months,--you to dismiss us any day, we to leave you. The experiment does
not please its: we thank you and depart."
RUGGE.--"That is not the truth. I said I was free to dismiss you both,
if the child did not suit. You, poor helpless creature, could be of no
use. But I never heard you say you were to be free too. Stands to
reason not! Put my engage ments at a Waife's mercy! I, Lorenzo Rugge!
--stuff! But I am a just man, and a liberal man, and if you think you
ought to have a higher salary, if this ungrateful proceeding is only, as
I take it, a strike for wages, I will meet you. Juliet Araminta does
play better than I could have supposed; and I'll conclude an engagement
on good terms, as we were to have done if the experiment answered, for
three years." Waife shook his head. "You are very good, Mr. Rugge, but
it is not a strike. My little girl does not like the life at any price;
and, since she supports me, I am bound to please her. Besides," said the
actor, with a stiffer manner, "you have broken faith with me. It was
fully understood that I was to appear no more on your stage; all my task
was to advise with you in the performances, remodel the plays, help in
the stage-management; and you took advantage of my penury, and, when I
asked for a small advance, insisted on forcing these relics of what I was
upon the public pity. Enough: we part. I bear no malice."
RUGGE.--"Oh, don't you? No more do I. But I am a Briton, and I have the
spirit of one. You had better not make an enemy of me."
WAIFE.--"I am above the necessity of making enemies. I have an enemy
ready made in myself."
Rugge placed a strong bony hand upon the cripple's arm. "I dare say you
have! A bad conscience, sir. How would you like your past life looked
into, and blabbed out?"
GENTLEMAN WAIFE (mournfully).--"The last four years of it have been spent
in your service, Mr. Rugge. If their record had been blabbed out for my
benefit, there would not have been a dry eye in the house."
RUGGE. "I disdain your sneer. When a scorpion nursed at my bosom sneers
at me, I leave it to its own reflections. But I don't speak of the years
in which that scorpion has been enjoying a salary and smoking canaster at
my expense. I refer to an earlier dodge in its checkered existence. Ha,
sir, you wince! I suspect I can find out something about you which
would--"
WAIFE (fiercely).--"Would what?"
RUGGE.--"Oh, lower your tone, sir; no bullying me. I suspect! I have
good reason for suspicion; and if you sneak off in this way, and cheat me
out of my property in Juliet Araminta, I will leave no stone unturned to
prove what I suspect: look to it, slight man! Come, I don't wish to
quarrel; make it up, and" (drawing out his pocket-book) "if you want cash
down, and will have an engagement in black and white for three years for
Juliet Araminta, you may squeeze a good sum out of me, and go yourself
where you please: you'll never be troubled by me. What I want is the
girl."
All the actor laid aside, Waife growled out, "And hang me; sir, if you
shall have the girl!"
At this moment Sophy opened the door wide, and entered boldly. She had
heard her grandfather's voice raised, though its hoarse tones did not
allow her to distinguish his words. She was alarmed for him. She came
in, his guardian fairy, to protect him from the oppressor of six feet
high. Rugge's arm was raised, not indeed to strike, but rather to
declaim. Sophy slid between him and her grandfather, and, clinging round
the latter, flung out her own arm, the forefinger raised menacingly
towards the Remorseless Baron. How you would have clapped if you had
seen her so at Covent Garden! But I'll swear the child did not know she
was acting. Rugge did, and was struck with admiration and regretful rage
at the idea of losing her.
"Bravo!" said he, involuntarily. "Come, come, Waife, look at her: she
was born for the stage. My heart swells with pride. She is my property,
morally speaking; make her so legally; and hark, in your ear, fifty
pounds. Take me in the humour,--Golconda opens,--fifty pounds!"
"No," said the vagrant.
"Well," said Rugge, sullenly; "let her speak for herself."
"Speak, child. You don't wish to return to Mr. Rugge,--and without me,
too,--do you, Sophy?"
"Without you, Grandy! I'd rather die first."
"You hear her; all is settled between us. You have had our services up
to last night; you have paid us up to last night; and so good morning to
you, Mr. Rugge."
"My dear child," said the manager, softening his voice as much as he
could, "do consider. You shall be so made of without that stupid old
man. You think me cross, but 't is he who irritates and puts me out of
temper. I 'm uncommon fond of children. I had a babe of my own once,--
upon my honour, I had,--and if it had not been for convulsions, caused by
teething, I should be a father still. Supply to me the place of that
beloved babe. You shall have such fine dresses; all new,--choose 'em
yourself,--minced veal and raspberry tarts for dinner every Sunday. In
three years, under my care, you will become a great actress, and make
your fortune, and marry a lord,--lords go out of their wits for great
actresses,--whereas, with him, what will you do? drudge and rot and
starve; and he can't live long, and then where will you be? 'T is a
shame to hold her so, you idle old vagabond."
"I don't hold her," said Waife, trying to push her away. "There's
something in what the man says. Choose for yourself, Sophy."
SOPHY (suppressing a sob).--"How can you have the heart to talk so,
Grandy? I tell you, Mr. Rugge, you are a bad man, and I hate you, and
all about you; and I'll stay with Grandfather; and I don't care if I do
starve: he sha'n't!"
MR. RUGGE (clapping both hands on the crown of his hat, and striding to
the door).--"William Waife, beware 't is done. I'm your enemy. As for
you, too dear but abandoned infant, stay with him: you'll find out very
soon who and what he is; your pride will have a fall, when--"
Waife sprang forward, despite his lameness,--both his fists clenched, his
one eye ablaze; his broad burly torso confronted and daunted the stormy
manager. Taller and younger though Rugge was, he cowered before the
cripple he had so long taunted and humbled. The words stood arrested
on his tongue. "Leave the room instantly!" thundered the actor,
in a voice no longer broken. "Blacken my name before that child by one
word, and I will dash the next down your throat." Rugge rushed to the
door, and keeping it ajar between Waife and himself, he then thrust in
his head, hissing forth,
"Fly, caitiff, fly! my revenge shall track your secret and place you in
my power. Juliet Araminta shall yet be mine." With these awful words
the Remorseless Baron cleared the stairs in two bounds, and was out of
the house.
Waife smiled contemptuously. But as the street-door clanged on the
form of the angry manager, the colour faded from the old man's face.
Exhausted by the excitement he had gone through, he sank on a chair,
and, with one quick gasp as for breath, fainted away.
