"Vivian?—never heard the name, sir. Vivian! Pooh, you are trying to hoax me; very good."
"I assure you, Mr Peac"—
"St—st—How the deuce did you know that I was once called Peac— that is, people called me Peac—A friendly nickname, no more—drop it, sir, or you 'touch me with noble anger!'"
"Well, well; 'the rose, by any name, will smell as sweet,' as the Swan, this time at least, judiciously observes. But Mr Vivian, too, seems to have other names at his disposal. I mean a young, dark, handsome man—or rather boy—with whom I met you in company by the roadside, one morning."
"O—h!" said Mr Peacock, looking much relieved, "I know whom you mean, though I don't remember to have had the pleasure of seeing you before. No; I have not heard anything of the young man lately. I wish I did know something of him. He was a 'gentleman in my own way.' Sweet Will has hit him off to a hair!—
'The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's eye, tongue, sword.'
Such a hand with a cue!—you should have seen him seek 'the bubble reputation at the cannon's mouth!' I may say, (continued Mr Peacock, emphatically,) that he was a regular trump—trump!" he reiterated with a start, as if the word had stung him—"trump! he was a BRICK!"
Then fixing his eyes on me, dropping his arms, interlacing his fingers, in the manner recorded of Talma in the celebrated "Qu'en dis-tu?" he resumed in a hollow voice, slow and distinct—
"When—saw—you—him,—young m—m—a—n—nnn?"
Finding the tables thus turned on myself, and not willing to give Mr Peac— any clue to poor Vivian—who thus appeared, to my great satisfaction, to have finally dropped an acquaintance more versatile than reputable—I contrived, by a few evasive sentences, to keep Mr Peac—'s curiosity at a distance, till he was summoned in haste to change his attire for the domestic drama. And so we parted.