“The muff—oh! dear, my lady, I’m so sorry I can’t have it for you—it’s not in the house nowhere—I parted with it out of hand directly upon your saying, my lady, that you desired it might never be suffered to come nigh your ladyship again. Then, says I to myself, since my lady can’t abide the smell, I can’t never wear it, which it would have been my pride to do; so I thought I could never get it fast enough out of the house.”
“And what did you do with it?”
“I made a present of it, my lady, to poor Mrs. Baxter, John Dutton’s sister, my lady, who was always so much attached to the family, and would have a regard for even the smallest relic, vestige, or vestment, I knew, above all things in nature, poor old soul!—she has, what with the rheumatic pains, and one thing or another, lost the use of her right arm, so it was particularly agreeable and appropriate—and she kissed the muff—oh! my lady, I’m sure I only wish your ladyship could have witnessed the poor soul’s veneration.”
In reply to a question which made my mother ask about the “poor soul,” I further learned that Mrs. Baxter was wife to a pawnbroker in Swallow-street. Fowler added, “If my lady wished any way for the muff, I can get it to-morrow morning by breakfast, or by the time you’s up, my lady.”
“Very well, very well, that will do, I suppose, will it not, Mr. Harrington?”
I bowed, and said not a word more—Fowler, I saw, was glad to get rid of the subject, and to go on to the treble ruffles, on which while she and my mother and Lady de Brantefield were descanting, I made my exit, and went to the ball-room.
I found Lady Anne Mowbray—talked nonsense to her ladyship for a quarter of an hour—and at last, à propos to her perfumed fan, I brought in the old muff with the horrid smell, on purpose to obtain a full description of it.
She told me that it was a gray fox-skin, lined with scarlet; that it had great pompadour-coloured knots at each end, and that it was altogether hideous. Lady Anne declared that she was heartily glad it would never shock her eyes more.
It was now just nine o’clock; people then kept better hours than they do at present; I was afraid that all the shops would be shut; but I recollected that pawnbrokers’ shops were usually kept open late. I lost no time in pursuing my object.
I took a hackney coach, bribed the coachman to drive very fast to Mr. Manessa—found Manessa and Jacob going to bed sleepy—but at sight of me Jacob was alert in an instant, and joyfully ready to go with me immediately to Baxter, the pawnbroker’s.