“Give me Fore Street,” she said. “There’s noise, if you like, but no cabbage-stalks.”
“This, ladies,” said the man after a pause, so that we might be overpowered with the grandeur of the house; “this is no other than the great Dr. Shovel’s house. Here shall you find a service as regular and as truly read as if you were in the cathedral itself. Not so much as an amen dropped. They do say that the Doctor is a private friend of the dean, and hand-in-glove with the bishop. This way. Your ladyship’s box? I will carry it. This is the good Doctor’s door. The clerk’s fee half-a-crown; your ladyship will not forget, unless the young gentleman, which is most likely, should like to make it half-a-guinea. I follow your ladyships. Doubt not that, early as it is, his reverence will be found up and ready for good works.”
“I believe,” said Mrs. Gambit, “that this man would talk the hind legs off a donkey. Keep close to me, Miss Kitty. Here may be villainy; and if there is, there’s one at least that shall feel the weight of my ten nails. Young man,” she addressed the fellow with sharpness, “you let that box alone, or if you carry it, go before; I trust Londoners as far as I can see them, and no farther.”
“Pray, ladies,” cried the man, “have no suspicion.”
“It’s all right,” said the coachman, grinning. “Lord! I’ve brought them here by dozens. Go in, madam. Go in, young lady.”
“This way, ladies,” cried the man. “The Doctor will see you within.”
“A clergyman,” continued Mrs. Gambit, taking no manner of notice of these interruptions, “may not always, no more than a builder’s foreman, choose where he would live. And if his parish is the Fleet Market, among the cabbages, as I suppose the Doctor’s is, or about the Fleet Prison, among the miserable debtors, as I suppose it may be, why he must fain live here with the cabbage-stalks beneath his nose, and make the best of it.”
“Your ladyship,” the messenger went on, addressing himself to me, “will shortly, no doubt, be made happy. The gentleman, however, hath not yet come. Pray step within, ladies.”
“You see, Miss Kitty,” said Mrs. Gambit, pointing to the window, with a disdainful look at this impertinent fellow, ”this is certainly the house. So far, therefore, we are safe.”
In the window there hung a card, on which was written in large characters, so that all might read: