Vanity Fair - Page 553/573

The day after the meeting at the play-table, Jos had himself arrayed

with unusual care and splendour, and without thinking it necessary to

say a word to any member of his family regarding the occurrences of the

previous night, or asking for their company in his walk, he sallied

forth at an early hour, and was presently seen making inquiries at the

door of the Elephant Hotel. In consequence of the fetes the house was

full of company, the tables in the street were already surrounded by

persons smoking and drinking the national small-beer, the public rooms

were in a cloud of smoke, and Mr. Jos having, in his pompous way, and

with his clumsy German, made inquiries for the person of whom he was in

search, was directed to the very top of the house, above the

first-floor rooms where some travelling pedlars had lived, and were

exhibiting their jewellery and brocades; above the second-floor

apartments occupied by the etat major of the gambling firm; above the

third-floor rooms, tenanted by the band of renowned Bohemian vaulters

and tumblers; and so on to the little cabins of the roof, where, among

students, bagmen, small tradesmen, and country-folks come in for the

festival, Becky had found a little nest--as dirty a little refuge as

ever beauty lay hid in.

Becky liked the life. She was at home with everybody in the place,

pedlars, punters, tumblers, students and all. She was of a wild, roving

nature, inherited from father and mother, who were both Bohemians, by

taste and circumstance; if a lord was not by, she would talk to his

courier with the greatest pleasure; the din, the stir, the drink, the

smoke, the tattle of the Hebrew pedlars, the solemn, braggart ways of

the poor tumblers, the sournois talk of the gambling-table officials,

the songs and swagger of the students, and the general buzz and hum of

the place had pleased and tickled the little woman, even when her luck

was down and she had not wherewithal to pay her bill. How pleasant was

all the bustle to her now that her purse was full of the money which

little Georgy had won for her the night before!

As Jos came creaking and puffing up the final stairs, and was

speechless when he got to the landing, and began to wipe his face and

then to look for No. 92, the room where he was directed to seek for the

person he wanted, the door of the opposite chamber, No. 90, was open,

and a student, in jack-boots and a dirty schlafrock, was lying on the

bed smoking a long pipe; whilst another student in long yellow hair and

a braided coat, exceeding smart and dirty too, was actually on his

knees at No. 92, bawling through the keyhole supplications to the

person within.

"Go away," said a well-known voice, which made Jos thrill, "I expect

somebody; I expect my grandpapa. He mustn't see you there."