If his room had been large enough to admit of it, he would have skipped round it again and again in his frantic ecstasy. Having read over several times the blessed letter of Mr. Gammon, he hastily folded it up, crumpled up the bank-note in his hand, clapped his hat on his head, blew out his candle, rushed down-stairs as if a mad dog were at his heels, and in three or four minutes' time might have been seen standing breathless before old Balls, whom he had almost electrified by asking, with an eager and joyous air, for a return of the articles which he had only an hour before pawned with him; at the same time laying down the duplicates and the bank-note. The latter, old Balls scrutinized with most anxious exactness, and even suspicion—but it seemed perfectly unexceptionable; so he re-delivered to Titmouse his precious ornaments, and the change out of his note, minus a trifling sum for interest. Titmouse then started off at top speed to Huckaback; but it suddenly occurring to him as possible that that gentleman, on hearing of his good fortune, might look for an immediate repayment of the ten shillings he had recently lent to Titmouse, he stopped short—paused—and returned home. There he had hardly been seated a moment, when down he pelted again, to buy a sheet of paper and a wafer or two, to write his letter to Mr. Gammon; which having obtained, he returned at the same speed, almost overturning his fat landlady, who looked after him as though he were a mad cat scampering up and down-stairs, and fearing that he had gone suddenly crazy. The note he wrote to Mr. Gammon was so exceedingly extravagant, that, candid as I have (I trust) hitherto shown myself in the delineation of Mr. Titmouse's character, I cannot bring myself to give the aforesaid letter to the reader—making all allowances for the extraordinary excitement of its writer.
Sleep, that night and morning, found and left Mr. Titmouse the assured exulting master of Ten Thousand a-Year. Of this fact, the oftener he read Mr. Gammon's letter, the stronger became his convictions. 'Twas undoubtedly rather a large inference from small premises; but it secured him unspeakable happiness, for a time, at a possible cost of future disappointment and misery, which he did not pause to consider. The fact is that logic (according to Dr. Watts, but not according to Dr. Whateley, the right use of reason) is not a practical art. No one regards it in actual life; observe, therefore, folks on all hands constantly acting like Tittlebat Titmouse in the case before us. His conclusion was—that he had become the certain master of ten thousand a-year; his premises were—what the reader has seen. I do not, however, mean to say, that if the reader be a youth hot from Oxford, he may not be able to prove, by a very refined and ingenious argument, that Titmouse was, in what he did above, a fine natural logician; for I recollect that some great philosopher hath demonstrated, by a famous argument, that there is nothing anywhere: and no one that I have heard of, hath ever been able to prove the contrary.
By six o'clock the next morning, Titmouse had, with his own hand, dropped his answer into the letter-box upon the door of Mr. Gammon's chambers in Thavies' Inn; in which answer he had, with numerous expressions of profound respect and gratitude, accepted Mr. Gammon's polite invitation. A very happy man felt Titmouse as he returned to Oxford Street; entering Messrs. Tag-rag's premises with alacrity, just as they were being opened, and volunteering his assistance in numerous things beyond his usual province, with singular briskness and energy; as if conscious that by doing so he was greatly gratifying Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap, whose wishes upon the subject he knew. He displayed such unwonted cheerfulness and patient good-nature throughout the day, that one of his companions, a serious youth, in a white neckerchief, black clothes, and with a blessed countenance—the only professing pious person in the establishment—took an occasion to ask him, in a mysterious whisper, "whether he had not got converted:" and whether he would, at six o'clock in the morning, accompany the speaker to a room in the neighborhood, where he (the youth aforesaid) was going to conduct an exhortation and prayer meeting! Titmouse refused—but not without a few qualms; for luck certainly seemed to be smiling on him, and he felt that he ought to be grateful for it; but then, he at length reflected, the proper place for that sort of thing would be a regular church—to which he accordingly resolved to go. This change of manners Tag-rag, however, looked upon as assumed only to affront him; seeing nothing but impertinence and defiance in all that Titmouse did—as if the nearer Titmouse got to the end of his bondage—i. e. the 10th of August—the lighter-hearted he grew! Titmouse resolved religiously to keep his own counsel; to avoid even—at all events for the present—communicating with Huckaback.
On the ensuing Sunday he rose very early, and took nearly twice as long a time as usual to dress—by reason of his often falling into many delicious and momentarily intoxicating reveries. By eleven o'clock he might have been seen entering the gallery of St. Andrew's Church, Holborn; where he considered that doubtless Mr. Gammon, who lived in the neighborhood, might have a seat. He asked three or four pew-openers, both below and above stairs, if they knew which was Mr. Gammon's pew—Mr. Gammon of Thavies' Inn; not dreaming of presumptuously going to the pew, but of sitting in some place which commanded a view of it. Mr. Gammon, I need hardly say, was quite unknown there—no one had ever heard of such a person; nevertheless Titmouse, (albeit a little galled at being, in spite of his elegant appearance, slipped into a back seat in the gallery,) remained to the close of the service—but his thoughts wandered grievously the whole time. Having quitted the church in a buoyant humor, he sauntered in the direction of Hyde Park. How soon might he become, instead of a mere spectator as heretofore, a partaker in its glories! The dawn of the day of fortune was on his long-benighted soul; and he could hardly subdue his excited feelings. Having eaten nothing but a couple of biscuits during the day, as the clock struck seven he made his punctual appearance at Mr. Gammon's, with a pair of span-new white kid gloves on; and somewhat flurried, was speedily ushered, by a comfortable-looking elderly female servant, into Mr. Gammon's room. Mr. Titmouse was dressed just as he had been when first presented to the reader, sallying forth into Oxford Street. Mr. Gammon, who was sitting reading the Sunday Flash at a table on which stood a couple of decanters, several wine-glasses, and one or two dishes of fruit, rose and received his distinguished visitor with the most delightful affability.
"I am most happy, Mr. Titmouse, to see you in this friendly way," said he, shaking him cordially by the hand.
"Oh, don't name it, sir!" quoth Titmouse, rather indistinctly, and hastily running his hand through his hair.
"I've nothing, you see, to offer you but a little fruit and a glass of fair port or sherry. You see I am a very quiet man on Sundays!"
"Particular fond of them, sir," replied Titmouse, endeavoring to clear his throat; for in spite of a strong effort to appear at his ease, he was unsuccessful; so that, when Gammon's keen eye glanced at the bedizened figure of his guest, a bitter smile passed over his face, without having been observed by Titmouse. "This," thought he, as his eye passed from the ring glittering on the little finger of the right hand, to the studs and breast-pin in the shirt-front, and thence to the guard-chain glaring entirely outside a damson-colored satin waistcoat, and the spotless white glove which yet glistened on the left hand—"This is the writer of the dismal epistle of the other day, announcing his desperation and destitution!"
"Your health, Mr. Titmouse!—help yourself!" said Mr. Gammon, in a cheerful and cordial tone; Titmouse pouring out a glass only three-quarters full, raised it to his lips with a slightly tremulous hand, and returned Mr. Gammon's salutation. When had Titmouse tasted a glass of wine before? a reflection occurring not only to himself, but also to Gammon, to whom it was a circumstance that might be serviceable.
"You see, Mr. Titmouse, mine's only a small bachelor's establishment, and I cannot put my old servant out of the way by having my friends to dinner"—[quite forgetting that the day before he had entertained at least six friends, including Mr. Frankpledge—but, the idea of going through a dinner with Mr. Titmouse!]