FullReads

“What a genius that child has!” he said; “why, she is a second Mrs. Norton!” and advanced smiling to peep over her shoulder and see what pretty thing Rosa was composing.

It was not poetry, though, that she was writing, and Fitz read as follows:–

“LILLIPUT STREET, Tuesday, 22nd May.

“Mr. and Mr. Fitzroy Tymmyns request the pleasure of Sir Thomas and Lady Kicklebury’s company at dinner on Wednesday, at 7 1/2 o’clock.”

“My dear!” exclaimed the barrister, pulling a long face.

“Law, Fitzroy!” cried the beloved of his bosom, “how you do startle one!”

“Give a dinner-party with our means!” said he.

“Ain’t you making a fortune, you miser?” Rosa said. “Fifteen guineas a day is four thousand five hundred a year; I’ve calculated it.” And, so saying, she rose and taking hold of his whiskers (which are as fine as those of any man of his circuit,) she put her mouth close up against his and did something to his long face, which quite changed the expression of it; and which the little page heard outside the door.

“Our dining-room won’t hold ten,” he said.

“We’ll only ask twenty, my love. Ten are sure to refuse in this season, when everybody is giving parties. Look, here is the list.”

“Earl and Countess of Bungay, and Lady Barbara Saint Mary’s.”

“You are dying to get a lord into the house,” Timmins said (HE had not altered his name in Fig-tree Court yet, and therefore I am not so affected as to call him TYMMYNS).

“Law, my dear, they are our cousins, and must be asked,” Rosa said.

“Let us put down my sister and Tom Crowder, then.”

“Blanche Crowder is really so VERY fat, Fitzroy,” his wife said, “and our rooms are so VERY small.”

Fitz laughed. “You little rogue,” he said, “Lady Bungay weighs two of Blanche, even when she’s not in the f–“

“Fiddlesticks!” Rose cried out. “Doctor Crowder really cannot be admitted: he makes such a noise eating his soup, that it is really quite disagreeable.” And she imitated the gurgling noise performed by the Doctor while inhausting his soup, in such a funny way that Fitz saw inviting him was out of the question.

“Besides, we mustn’t have too many relations,” Rosa went on. “Mamma, of course, is coming. She doesn’t like to be asked in the evening; and she’ll bring her silver bread-basket and her candlesticks, which are very rich and handsome.”

“And you complain of Blanche for being too stout!” groaned out Timmins.

“Well, well, don’t be in a pet,” said little Rosa. “The girls won’t come to dinner; but will bring their music afterwards.” And she went on with the list.

“Sir Thomas and Lady Kicklebury, 2. No saying no: we MUST ask them, Charles. They are rich people, and any room in their house in Brobdingnag Gardens would swallow up OUR humble cot. But to people in OUR position in SOCIETY they will be glad enough to come. The city people are glad to mix with the old families.”

“Very good,” says Fitz, with a sad face of assent–and Mrs. Timmins went on reading her list.

“Mr. and Mrs. Topham Sawyer, Belgravine Place.”

“Mrs. Sawyer hasn’t asked you all the season. She gives herself the airs of an empress; and when–“

“One’s Member, you know, my dear, one must have,” Rosa replied, with much dignity as if the presence of the representative of her native place would be a protection to her dinner. And a note was written and transported by the page early next morning to the mansion of the Sawyers, in Belgravine Place.

The Topham Sawyers had just come down to breakfast; Mrs. T. in her large dust-colored morning-dress and Madonna front (she looks rather scraggy of a morning, but I promise you her ringlets and figure will stun you of an evening); and having read the note, the following dialogue passed:–

Mrs. Topham Sawyer.–“Well, upon my word, I don’t know where things will end. Mr. Sawyer, the Timminses have asked us to dinner.”

Mr. Topham Sawyer.–“Ask us to dinner! What d—– impudence!”