第268章

RELATES HOW MR.PICKWICK, WITH THE ASSISTANCE OFSAMUEL WELLER, ESSAYED TO SOFTEN THE HEART OF MR.BENJAMIN ALLEN, AND TOMOLLIFY THE WRATH OF MR.ROBERT SAWYER

M R.B EN A LLEN and Mr.Bob Sawyer sat together in the little surgery behind the shop, discussing minced veal and future prospects, when the discourse, not unnaturally, turned upon the practice acquired by Bob the aforesaid, and his present chances of deriving a competent independence from the honourable profession to which he had devoted himself.

"--Which, I think," observed Mr.Bob Sawyer, pursuing the thread of the subject, "which, I think, Ben, are rather dubious.""What's rather dubious?" inquired Mr.Ben Allen, at the same time sharpening his intellects with a draught of beer."What's dubious?""Why, the chances," responded Mr.Bob Sawyer.

"I forgot," said Mr.Ben Allen."The beer has reminded me that I forgot, Bob--yes; they are dubious.""It's wonderful how the poor people patronise me," said Mr.Bob Sawyer, reflectively."They knock me up, at all hours of the night; they take medicine to an extent which I should have conceived impossible; they put on blisters and leeches with a perseverance worthy of a better cause; they make additions to their families, in a manner which is quite awful.Six of those last-named little promissory notes, all due on the same day, Ben, and all intrusted to me!""It's very gratifying, isn't it?" said Mr.Ben Allen, holding his plate for some more minced veal.

"Oh, very," replied Bob; "only not quite so much so, as the confidence of patients with a shilling or two to spare, would be.This business was capitally described in the advertisement, Ben.It is a practice, a very extensive practice--and that's all.""Bob," said Mr.Ben Allen, laying down his knife and fork, and fixing his eyes on the visage of his friend: "Bob, I'll tell you what it is.""What is it?" inquired Mr.Bob Sawyer.

"You must make yourself, with as little delay as possible, master of Arabella's one thousand pounds.""Three per cent.consolidated Bank annuities, now standing in her name in the book or books of the Governor and Company of the Bank of England,"added Bob Sawyer, in legal phraseology.

"Exactly so," said Ben."She has it when she comes of age, or marries.

She wants a year of coming of age, and if you plucked up a spirit she needn't want a month of being married.""She's a very charming and delightful creature," quoth Mr.Robert Sawyer, in reply; "and has only one fault that I know of, Ben.It happens, unfortunately, that that single blemish is a want of taste.She don't like me.""It's my opinion that she don't know what she does like," said Mr.Ben Allen, contemptuously.

"Perhaps not," remarked Mr.Bob Sawyer."But it's my opinion that she does know what she doesn't like, and that's of more importance.""I wish," said Mr.Ben Allen, setting his teeth together, and speaking more like a savage warrior who fed on raw wolf's flesh which he carved with his fingers, than a peaceable young gentleman who ate minced veal with a knife and fork, "I wish I knew whether any rascal really has been tampering with her, and attempting to engage her affections.I think Ishould assassinate him, Bob."

"I'd put a bullet in him, if I found him out," said Mr.Sawyer, stopping in the course of a long draught of beer, and looking malignantly out of the porter pot."If that didn't do his business, I'd extract it afterwards, and kill him that way."Mr.Benjamin Allen gazed abstractedly on his friend for some minutes in silence, and then said:

"You have never proposed to her, point-blank, Bob?""No.Because I saw it would be of no use," replied Mr.Robert Sawyer.

"You shall do it, before you are twenty-four hours older," retorted Ben, with desperate calmness."She shall have you, or I'll know the reason why.I'll exert my authority.""Well," said Mr.Bob Sawyer, "we shall see.""We shall see, my friend," replied Mr.Ben Allen, fiercely.He paused for a few seconds, and added in a voice broken by emotion, "You have loved her from a child, my friend.You loved her when we were boys at school together, and, even then, she was wayward, and slighted your young feelings.Do you recollect, with all the eagerness of a child's love, one day pressing upon her acceptance, two small caraway-seed biscuits and one sweet apple, neatly folded into a circular parcel with the leaf of a copybook?""I do," replied Bob Sawyer.

"She slighted that, I think?" said Ben Allen.

"She did," rejoined Bob."She said I had kept the parcel so long in the pockets of my corduroys, that the apple was unpleasantly warm.""I remember," said Mr.Allen, gloomily."Upon which we ate it ourselves, in alternate bites."Bob Sawyer intimated his recollection of the circumstance last alluded to, by a melancholy frown; and the two friends remained for some time absorbed, each in his own meditations.

While these observations were being exchanged between Mr.Bob Sawyer and Mr.Benjamin Allen; and while the boy in the grey livery, marvelling at the unwonted prolongation of the dinner, cast an anxious look, from time to time, towards the glass door, distracted by inward misgivings regarding the amount of minced veal which would be ultimately reserved for his individual cravings; there rolled soberly on through the streets of Bristol, a private fly, painted of a sad green colour, drawn by a chubby sort of brown horse, and driven by a surly-looking man with his legs dressed like the legs of a groom, and his body attired in the coat of a coachman.Such appearances are common to many vehicles belonging to, and maintained by, old ladies of economic habits; and in this vehicle, sat an old lady who was its mistress and proprietor.

"Martin!" said the old lady, calling to the surly man, out of the front window.

"Well?" said the surly man, touching his hat to the old lady.

"Mr.Sawyer's," said the old lady.

"I was going there," said the surly man.