The success of Christabel, “the mysterious lady,” in some new business at the Severntown races, together with the high appreciation which the working classes exhibited of the tricks of “Momus” and his master, induced the showman to make a considerable stay at Severntown.
Mr. Henry Bilks, “the only living skeleton extant,” had also made overtures to Mr. Martin to join him in a permanent winter exhibition, and, so strangely does one thing influence another, that the advertisement of Mr. Shuffleton Gibbs played its part in the scheme.
The Temple of Magic had already been removed to the Blue Post’s Yard, where “the riders” and other companies of public entertainers usually took their stand; the public had already been addressed in grandiloquent terms, in very grey ink, on very thin paper; and Mr. Dibble had solemnly done duty “on the outside” for many nights, when Mr. Bilks drove to the side-door, (“private entrance, ladies and gentlemen, at the side, price three pence!”), and without further ado went behind the magic curtain, and offered to join the wizard for the winter season, if the wizard would take a shop in some public street, advertise the exhibition, and conduct it upon something like high-class principles.
The “living skeleton” had left with the showman copies of various testimonials, and a copy of the Slumkey Guardian. It was in this latter journal that Martin had spelled out the Loan Office advertisement, whereupon he dictated to Dibble the terms of a letter which should be sent to James Marfleeting, Esq.
It was a strangely quaint and ungrammatical letter this, penned by Thomas Dibble. It set forth, in big straggling letters, that the writer was the proprietor of an exhibition of considerable fame in the provinces; that he was anxious to add thereto additional attractions, and make it a permanent thing for the winter at the important city of Severntown, where it had recently attained to a pitch of great celebrity.
The writer required a loan of one hundred pounds for six months, re-payable by instalments, and he was prepared to give his bond for the amount, together with security upon his properties.
“Indeed,” said Mr. Shuffleton Gibbs, who was just preparing to remove his quarters from the street off the Strand. “Indeed! Thomas Dibble, by all that is wonderful! I never forget handwriting, and I shall never forget Master Dibble’s above everybody else’s. Surely he has not turned showman? No; he is the exhibitor’s fag, his man-of-all-work, and he has written this letter from dictation. I will reply by-and-by. Meanwhile, I must see what there is to be made out of this with Mrs. Dibble. I fancy the old girl would give something to know where her faithless Tommy is.”
Thus soliloquised Mr. Shuffleton Gibbs, whilst he packed up sundry letters and papers, and prepared to change his residence.
Some of his correspondents were beginning to be tiresome; they had commenced to require explanations of the continued delay; and the women who had written to the Coffee House in the City, were appealing in heart-breaking terms for the promised materials, or the return of their money.
“It is getting hot,” the ex-swell went on. “I can’t stand these pathetic epistles; they hurt my feelings. Poor creatures! They would surely be satisfied if they knew that they were contributing to maintain the faded splendours—ah! of a buck out of luck. That’s rhyme—’gad, bless my soul! who would have thought that I should burst out into rhyme? I am very sorry, ladies, that I cannot afford to forward the materials in question, nor the trifling sums which you have—haw—entrusted to my care. And, messieurs, les pauvres gentilhommes, and you, ye wretched traders, who get into debt beyond your means of payment, I will make further inquiries into your cases. Meanwhile I am much obliged to you for the fees which you have forwarded so promptly.”