FullReads

These are few social historians of those days who have not told of the long and fierce struggle between those two famous bucks, Sir Charles Tregellis and Lord Barrymore, for the Lordship of the Kingdom of St. James, a struggle which divided the whole of fashionable London into two opposing camps. It has been chronicled also how the peer retired suddenly and the commoner resumed his great career without a rival. Only here, however, one can read the real and remarkable reason for this sudden eclipse of a star.

It was one morning in the days of this famous struggle that Sir Charles Tregellis was performing his very complicated toilet, and Ambrose, his valet, was helping him to attain that pitch of perfection which had long gained him the reputation of being the best-dressed man in town. Suddenly Sir Charles paused, his coup d’archet half-executed, the final beauty of his neck-cloth half-achieved, while he listened with surprise and indignation upon his large, comely, fresh-complexioned face. Below, the decorous hum of Jermyn Street had been broken by the sharp, staccato, metallic beating of a doorknocker.

“I begin to think that this uproar must be at our door,” said Sir Charles, as one who thinks aloud. “For five minutes it has come and gone; yet Perkins has his orders.”

At a gesture from his master Ambrose stepped out upon the balcony and craned his discreet head over it. From the street below came a voice, drawling but clear.

“You would oblige me vastly, fellow, if you would do me the favour to open this door,” said the voice.

“Who is it? What is it?” asked the scandalised Sir Charles, with his arrested elbow still pointing upwards.

Ambrose had returned with as much surprise upon his dark face as the etiquette of his position would allow him to show.

“It is a young gentleman, Sir Charles.”

“A young gentleman? There is no one in London who is not aware that I do not show before midday. Do you know the person? Have you seen him before?”

“I have not seen him, sir, but he is very like some one I could name.”

“Like some one? Like whom?”

“With all respect, Sir Charles, I could for a moment have believed that it was yourself when I looked down. A smaller man, sir, and a youth; but the voice, the face, the bearing–“

“It must be that young cub Vereker, my brother’s ne’er-do-weel,” muttered Sir Charles, continuing his toilet. “I have heard that there are points in which he resembles me. He wrote from Oxford that he would come, and I answered that I would not see him. Yet he ventures to insist. The fellow needs a lesson! Ambrose, ring for Perkins.”

A large footman entered with an outraged expression upon his face.

“I cannot have this uproar at the door, Perkins!”

“If you please, the young gentleman won’t go away, sir.”

“Won’t go away? It is your duty to see that he goes away. Have you not your orders? Didn’t you tell him that I am not seen before midday?”

“I said so, sir. He would have pushed his way in, for all I could say, so I slammed the door in his face.”

“Very right, Perkins.”

“But now, sir, he is making such a din that all the folk are at the windows. There is a crowd gathering in the street, sir.”

From below came the crack-crack-crack of the knocker, ever rising in insistence, with a chorus of laughter and encouraging comments from the spectators. Sir Charles flushed with anger. There must be some limit to such impertinence.

“My clouded amber cane is in the corner,” said he. “Take it with you, Perkins. I give you a free hand. A stripe or two may bring the young rascal to reason.”