Fanny's First Novel

by Frank Frankfort Moore

“Why, yes, sir, and hand too, if you insist,” said Johnson. “And let me tell you, sir, that a Lichfield man will keep his hand on anything he wishes to retain when another Lichfield man is in the same room.”

His laughter set the ornaments on the mantelpiece a-jingling.

And they went in to dinner before the echoes had died away.

Mrs. Thrale kept her promise, and Fanny was placed next to Johnson. But even then he did not let go her hand. He held it in one of his own and patted it gently with the other. Fanny glanced down the table and saw that the eyes of the young Roman were looking in her direction, and that they were flaming. What could he mean, she wondered. She had been at first amazed at his bearing toward her in the drawing-room; but after a moment's thought, she had supposed that he had assumed that distant manner to prevent anyone from suspecting the intimacy there was between them. But what could that angry look in his eyes portend? Was it possible that he could be jealous of Dr. Johnson's awkward attention to her?

She was greatly troubled.

But if he had, indeed, resented Johnson's attention to her, such a plea was no longer valid after the first dish had been served, for in an instant Johnson's attention was transferred, with increased force, to the plate before him, and during the solid part of the meal, at least, it was never turned in any other direction. Poor Fanny had never seen him eat, nor had she the same privilege in respect of Mr. Thrale. But she needed all the encouragement that her hostess could afford her to enable her to make even the most moderate meal while such distractions were in her immediate neighbourhood; and she came to the conclusion that she had been ridiculously fastidious over the prodigious tea and its service at Mr. Barlowe's in the Poultry.

But Mrs. Thrale was as tactful and as chatty as ever, and Mr. Seward made pleasant conversation for her, sitting, as he did, on the other side from Johnson. When Johnson was eating, his fellow guests understood that their chance was come to express their views without a dread of being contradicted by him.

But from the feebleness of her contribution to the chat of the table, Mrs. Thrale as well as Mr. Seward perceived that all they had been told about the timidity of little Miss Burney was even less than the truth.

But for that matter, Signor Rauzzini, who had been placed between Mrs. Thrale and Dr. Burney, was found by both of them to be also singularly averse from joining in the conversation, whether in reply to Burney, who addressed him in Italian, or to his hostess, who spoke French to him.

As Mrs. Thrale talked a good deal herself, however, she rose with an impression that there had been no especial lack of brilliancy at the table.