LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2099, 15 November 1880, Page 3

LITERATURE.

THE GUINEA BOX,

In Two Chapters. [From the “Cornhill Magazine. ”3 Chapter I. ( Continued.) ‘ Stuff and nonsense!' he said ; ‘ Gilbert never insults any one, Whatsver his faults, he is a most good-natured young fellow, though a little hasty in his temper. Now tell me what has happened. Ton look excited. lam afraid you took a glass of wine or so at dinner more than you have been accustomed to.’

That was very true, for at my Blackheath school wine was an extra, though politeness was not; but I certainly had not taken too much wine. My mind, indeed, was sufficiently clear to make me understand how important it was to prove that I was sober. ‘No, ’ said I, ‘ I was particularly abstemious, Mr Tredgold. Observe the long words lam using without making the least mistake. Give me anything out of the newspapers to read—the city article or the share list—and try whether I am drank or not.’ * I never said you were drunk, my good lad,’ said the lawyer, half amused, half touched, by my earnest pleading. ‘ No, sir ; but your son said it, lam not used to misbehave myself in the presence of ladies, nor to bo accused of doing so.’ * Come, sit down and tell me qnistly what happened, Frank.’ So I sat down and told him all, not omitting my own view of the cut direct which had been administered to the strange lady by the members of his family. ‘lt is very curious,’ said he, when I had done ; ‘ but I acquit you, Frank, of all imputation of having been intoxicated ; I also excuse Gilbert for it; it was a very naiural mistake for him to have fallen into. My opinion is that you were in a state of great mental excitement, produced partly by the fact of being at the theatre and partly by the play itself, which gave yonr ideas a certain supernatural bias. You were just in the frame of mind to suffer from an optical delusion.’ ‘ But do you mean to say I did not see that lidy in white satin?’ *On the stage yon may have done so. I don’t know whether they dress Ophelia on the stage (like Tilburina) in white satin nowadays, but in that box you certainly did not see her. Now just go to bed, Frank, like a good fallow. You’ll be better without it. There’s your flat candle; good night and pleasant creams.’ I felt the old lawyer was treating me very tenderly, since he had nothing but my word to go upon against (lor I had admitted os much) that of his whole family; but I was by no means amicably disposed toward them.

In the morning, when I came down to breakfast, every one was studiously polite to me and evidently determined to make no allusion to what had happened on the previous evening ; at times I caught Gilbert Tredgold glancing at me with an amused expression, and then turning away with a sort of bloated look, and hia eyes half out of hia head, like a lobster's. If I had attempted an explanation I think it would have been the death of him, but I was not at all restrained from it cn that account. I was too proud to enter anew upon any justification of my conduct; and as to any apology, it was clear that it ought to have come from them. Before I concluded my visit, however, I did address a few words of remonstrance to Lucy concerning the practical joke, as I termed it, which had been played upon me in the theatre, and to which she had been an accessory, I didn’t care about it myself, I told her, so much, as I though it unkind; but that they should have all agreed to ignore the presence of their lady visitor showed, 1 thought, bad feeling. ‘My dear Mr Garrard,’ she said, with quite unwonted severity, ‘ I had hoped you had made up your mind to say nothing about that unpleasant subject; let bygones be bygones, I do beg.’ I had no idea (at that time] that a young woman could speak so sharply, ‘Well, I never,’ cried I, in a tone which betrayed, perhaps, my astonishment at her imprudence, for she replied still more tartly—‘Nor I either; though, indeed, I have read in “ David Ccpparfield ” of a young gentleman misbehaving himself in a theatre in a similar fashion.’ I remember, of coarse, that on that occasion David had been intoxicated, and the injustice of the allusion hurt me very much, I did not answer, bnt looked so distressed that her heart melted, ‘ Agnes was very much shocked at him,’ she continued, with a smile ; ‘ but afterward, yon know, upon expressing his sorrow, she forgave him.’ ‘I think she even gave him a kiss,’ said I boldly, but in a very tender voice. ‘I don’t remember that,’ she answered, looking at her toes. ‘Agnes was rather prndish in that way.’ Which, of course, was an invitation ; and so ended very pleasantly my experience of the Guinea Box for that time. Chapter 11. If it is true that there is ‘no such thing as forgetting,’ it is certain that we so often mislay the remembrance of things that it is almost as bad (or good) as thongh we did forget. My adventure with the lady in satin was certainly noteworthy enough, yet week by week, and month by month, it faded as her satin itself wonld have done, till in a few years after the thing had happened, I could not have sworn to the details as when they were fresh in my memory. I met the Tredgolds from time ta time, and when a sly allusion, as sometimes happened, was made to the circumstance. I found myself replying to their aspersions with less and less vigor. I know I had not been drunk ; I knew I had not been unreasonably excited by the play, and yet that much-wronged lady in white became in a certain degree unreal even to myself. It was still one of those experiences that one cannot explain (and which happen to more of us than care to confess to them) ; but I no longer cudgled my brains for an explanation of It. The circumstance was still very strange, but (which had not struck me so forcibly in my boyhood) it was almost as much so that a respectable family like the Tredgolds should have treated a lady visitor with such rndeneas, and they should make a jest of it. Seven years afterward, and when I had jnst taken my degree at the University, I was dining with some friends at the Oxford and Cambridge ( Hub, one of whom happened to propose a visit to Oovent Garden Theatre. As the office was closed, he sent out to the librarian’s for a box, and when It came he observed—

‘By Jove, this is a cheap business ; we have got the Guinea Box.’ He was a man about town, and knew No. 16 ; but upon the rest of us it made no impression. After dinner we went up stairs to smoke, and consequently arrived at the theatre at a late and fashionable hour. I chanced to be the first of the party, and on stepping out of the little room into the box I turned and stopped the others. ‘We have made a mistake,’ I said ; ‘ there is someone in possession already.’ ‘ Ob, pooh!’ said my friend, the man about town ; ‘we’re all right enough. Do you suppose I don’t know No. 16 ?’ • But there’s a lady in it, ’ said I, ‘ sitting there alone.’

‘ Then let mo look at her,’was the characteristic rejoinder. He pushed his way in, and exclaimed, • What lady ?’ As I spoke the words the whole scene of seven years before recurred tfl me with vivid distinctness. 1 saw the Tied golds unconscious wilfully an I hid though', ••£ the intruder’s presence. I saw Lucy touch Usr brother, and hoard him whisper in thst quick, remonstrant voice, ‘ What the douce is the matter with you ?’ Only this time it was somebody else said it. One of my companions had taken hold of my arm, and the rest were staring at me while I stared at the lady. 1 1 have seen her before,’ I muttered ; ‘ it’s the same person; I could swear to her among a thousand.’ ‘My dear Garrard, you’re not well, ’ said some one—it was Grantham, my college obnm, ‘ Just come with me,’ and he led me into the ante- room.

* But the lady ?’ I said ; * they have sat down by her aa thongh she was not there.’ ‘There’s no lady there; you’re dreaming.

That champagne at the club is not a sufficiently dry wine. ’ ‘ What, do yon mean to say, as the other did, that I am drank ?’ ‘ I don’t know what the other people said, hut if I did not know your habits I should say you had the delirium tremens. ’ ] ‘lt must be the box,’ said lin amazement— ‘ the box must be haunted!’ ‘Very likely 1 was Grantham’s grave rejoinder. * Let’s get out of the box and into the open air.’ Ha led me unresistingly into the street, and we walked around Covent Garden together, discussing the matter. I told my fiiend what had happened on the previous occasion, and he pretended to explain my present hallucination, as he termed it, by the association of ideas. ‘ Yon recognised the box, and then the scene recurred to yon.’ There was something in that (for the scene had recurred to me), but not enough to shake the evidence ot my o--vn senses a second time. ‘However, I don’t want to make a row, but I will sift this mystery to the very bottom, ’ ‘Do,’said Grantham, “and let me knew what remains, if it’s anything beyond a headashe,’ Whereupon I went to my lodgings and sat up half the night, with a cigar in my month and my consideiing cip on. In my friends’ eyes I had made a fool of myself twico in Box No, 16, and I was resolved that it should not happen again. Nor should this be effected by absenting myself from the theatre. I meant to examine into that box very carefully, and somehow or other to knock the bottom out of it. After breakfast next morning I call at the library, where, as I saw in tne paper, the ‘ Guinea Box ’ at Coveat Garden was advertised as usual, and requested to see the proprietor of the establishment. That great man, it teemed, did not generally put in an appearance in connection with any matter under a stall for the season, but, nevertheless, I gained admission to his august presence. ‘ Pray, sir,’ said I, ‘have you ever heard any complaints of your Guinea Box?’ • Complaints ?’ he said. ‘ Ear from it; it is one of the best and by far the cheapest 1 have to let. ’ Though his voice was firm, it struck me that his manner was a little embarrassed. ‘When good things are cheap,’ said I, ‘ there is generally a reason for it. I have twice had reason so be very much dissatisfied with that box. A lady in white satin is in the habit of intruding herself there. ’ I saw a sudden change in his fa’e, which convinced me he was not hearing the information for the first time, but he answered coolly enough, *lf that is so, the box-keeper is the proper person to apply to ; and if she annoys you, the police. I have not the honor of knowing your name, by the bye,’ he added. 1 gave him my card, and he looked at it attentively. (To be continued.)