Mrs Howel received the Admiral, seated, with an air of state, upon her arm-chair; at one side of which stood Mrs Rawlins, and at the other Hilson. The landlord was stationed near the door; and Juliet, indignant, though trembling, placed herself at a window; determining rather, with whatever mortification, to seek the protection of the Admiral, than to avow who she was thus publicly, thus disgracefully, and thus compulsorily.
The Admiral entered with the martial air of a man used to command; and whose mind was made up not to be put out of his way. He bestowed, nevertheless, three low bows, with great formality, to the sex of Mrs Howel; to the first of which she arose and courtsied, returning the two others by an inclination of the head, and bidding Hilson bring the Admiral a chair.
The Admiral, having adjusted himself, his hat, and his sword to his liking, said, ‘I wish you good morning, Ma’am. You won’t take it amiss, I hope, that I make free to wait upon you myself, for the sake of having a small matter of discourse with you, about a certain chap that I understand to be one of your domestics; a place whereof, if I may judge by what I have seen of him, he is not over and above worthy.’
‘If any of my people, Sir,’ answered Mrs Howel, ‘have forgotten what is due to an officer of your rank, I shall take care to make them sensible of my displeasure.’
The Admiral, much gratified, made her a low bow, saying, ‘A lady, Ma’am, such as I suppose you to be, can’t fail having a right way of thinking. But that sort of gentry, as I have taken frequent note, have an ugly kind of a knack, of treating people rather short that have got a favour to ask; the which I don’t uphold. And this is the main reason that I think it right to give you an item of my opinion upon this matter, respecting that lad; who just now, in my proper view, let a young gentlewoman call and squall after him, till she was black in the face, without so much as once veering round, to say, Pray, Ma’am, what do you please to want?’
Hilson, now, triumphant that he could plead his haste to obey the commands of his lady, was beginning an affronted self-defence; when the Admiral, accidentally perceiving Juliet, hastily arose; and in a fit of unrestrained choler, clinching his double fist at Hilson, cried, ‘Why what sort of a fellow are you, Sir? to bring me a chair while you see a lady standing? Which do you take to be strongest? An old weather beaten tar, such as I am; or a poor weak female, that could not lend a hand to the pump, thof the vessel were going to the bottom?’
Approaching Juliet, then with his own arm-chair, he begged her to be seated; saying, ‘The lad will take care to bring another to me, I warrant him! A person who has got a scrap of gold-lace sewed upon his jacket, is seldom overlooked by that kind of gentry; for which reason I make no great account of complaisance, when I am dizened in my full dress uniform,—which, by the way, is a greater ceremony-monger than this, by thus much (measuring with his finger) more of tinsel!’
Juliet, gratefully thanking him, but declining his offer, thought this an opportunity not to be missed, to attempt, under his courageous auspice, to escape. She courtsied to him, therefore, and was walking away: but Mrs Howel, swelling with ire, already, at such civility to a creature whom she had condemned to scorn, now flamed with passion, and openly told the landlord, to let that young woman pass at his peril.
Juliet, who saw in the anger which was mixed with the amazement of the Admiral, that she had a decided defender at hand, collected her utmost presence of mind, and, advancing to Mrs Howel, said, ‘I have offered to you, Madam, any explanation you may require alone; but in public I offer you none!’
‘If you think yourself still dealing with a novice of the inexperience of sixteen,’ answered Mrs Howel, ‘you will find yourself mistaken. I will neither trust to the arts of a private recital, nor save your pride from a public examination.’
Then, addressing the Admiral, ‘All yesterday morning, Sir,’ she continued, ‘I had sundry articles, such as rings, bank-notes, and letters of value, dispersed in my apartment, from a security that it was sacred; but the chambermaid informs me, that she caught this young woman entering it, under pretence of waiting upon a young lady, then in the inner room; and the same chambermaid, an hour after, found that she was still here; and endeavouring to conceal, in her work-bag something that she had wrapt into a sheet of paper, that was confessedly pilfered from my table.’—
The Admiral, observing, in the midst of the disturbance of Juliet at this attack, an air of offended dignity, which urged him to believe that she was innocent, unhesitatingly answered, ”Tis an old saying, Madam, and a wise one, that standers-by see the most of the game; and I have taken frequent note, that we are all of one mind, till we have heard two sides of the question: for which reason I hold it but fair, that the young gentlewoman should be asked what she has to say for herself.’
‘Can you suppose, Sir,’ said Mrs Howel, the veins of whose face and throat now looked bursting, ‘that I mean to canvass this matter upon terms of equality? that I intend to be my own pleader against a pauper and an impostor?’—
Juliet here held her hand upon her forehead, as if scarcely able to sustain the indignant pain with which she was seized; and the fierce frown of the Admiral, showed his gauntlet not merely ready to be flung on the ground, but almost in the face of her adversary; Mrs Howel, however, went on.
‘I do not pretend to affirm that any thing has been purloined; but the circumstances of the case are certainly extraordinary; and I should be sorry to run the risk of wrongfully suspecting,—should something hereafter be missing,—any of my own people. I demand, therefore, immediately, an explanation of this transaction.’
The Admiral, full of angry feelings as he looked at the panting Juliet, replied, himself; ‘To my seeming, Madam, the short cut to the truth in this business, would be for you to cast an eye upon your own affairs; which I doubt not but you will find in very good trim; and if you should like to know what passes in my mind, I must needs make bold to remark, that I think the so doing would be more good natured, by a fellow-creature, than putting a young gentlewoman out of c............