"I won't take the bet," said Brogten, "because I believe you'll succeed."

"I'll t-t-take it for the fun," said Fitzurse.

"Done, then!" said Bruce.

So Bruce, _pour pa.s.ser le temps_, deliberately undertook the corruption of a human soul. That soul might have been low enough already; for Hazlet was, as we have seen, mean-hearted and malicious, and in him, although unknown to himself, the garb of the Pharisee but concealed the breast of the hypocrite. But yet Hazlet _was_ free, and if Bruce had not undertaken the devil's work, might have been free to his life's end, from all gross forms of transgression--from all the more flagrant and open delinquencies that lay waste the inner sanct.i.ties of a fallen human soul.

He was an easy subject for Bruce's machinations, and those machinations were conceived and carried on with consummate and characteristic cleverness. Bruce did not spread his net in the sight of the bird, but set to work with wariness and caution. He determined to try the arts of fascination, not of force. The thought of the desperate wickedness involved in his attempt either never crossed his mind, or, if it did, was rejected as the feeble suggestion of an over-scrupulous conscience.

Bruce pretended at least to fancy that the basis of all men's characters was identical, and that, as they only differed in external manifestations, it made very little difference whether Hazlet became "fast" or continued "slow." "Fast" and "slow" were the mild euphemisms with which Bruce expressed the slight distinction between a vicious and a virtuous life.

At hall--the grand place for rencontres--he managed to get a seat next to his victim, and began at once to treat him with that appearance of easy and well-bred familiarity which he had learnt in London circles.

He threw a gentle expression of interest into his face and voice, he listened with deference to Hazlet's remarks, he addressed several questions to him, thanked him politely for all his information, and then adroitly introduced some delicate compliments on the agreeableness of Hazlet's society. His bait took completely; Hazlet, whom most men snubbed, was quite fl.u.s.tered with gratified vanity at the condescending notice of so unexceptionable a man of fashion as the handsome and noted Vyvyan Bruce. "At last," thought Hazlet, "men are beginning to appreciate my intellectual powers."

After continuing this process for some days, until Hazlet was unalterably convinced that he must be a vastly agreeable and attractive person, Bruce asked him to come to breakfast, and invited Brogten and Fitzurse to meet him. He calculated justly that Hazlet, accustomed only to the very quiet neighbourhood of a country village, would be duly impressed with the presence and acquaintance of a live lord; and he instructed both his guests in the manner in which they should treat the subject of their experiment. Hazlet thought he had never enjoyed a breakfast party so much. There was a delicious spice of worldliness in the topics of conversation which was quite refreshing to him, accustomed as he was to the somewhat droning moralisms of his "congenial friends."

Nothing which could deeply shock his prejudices was ever alluded to, but the discussions which were introduced came to him with all the charm of novelty and awakened curiosity.

Hazlet never could endure being a silent or inactive listener while a conversation was going forward. No matter how complete his ignorance of the subject, he generally managed to hazard some remarks. Bruce talked a good deal about actors and theatres, and Hazlet had never seen a theatre in his life. He did not like, however, to confess this fact, and, after a little hesitation, began to talk as if he were an habitue.

The dramatic criticisms, which he occasionally saw in the papers, furnished him with just materials enough to amuse Bruce and the others at his a.s.sumption of "savoir vivre," and to furnish a laugh at his expense the moment he was gone; but of this he was blissfully unconscious, and he rather plumed himself on his knowledge of the world.

He had yet to learn the lesson that consistency alone can secure respect. He had indeed ventured at first to remark, "Don't you think the stage a little--just a little--objectionable?"

"Objectionable," said Bruce, with a bland smile; "oh, my dear fellow, what can you mean? Why, the stage is a mirror of the world, and to show virtue her own image is one of its main objects."

"Yes," said Hazlet, "I am inclined to think so. I should like to see a theatre, I confess."

He had let slip unintentionally the implied admission that he had never been to a theatre; but when Fitzurse asked in astonishment, "What, have you never been to a theatre?" he merely replied, "Well, I can hardly say I have; at least not for a long time."

"Oh, then we must all run down to London some night very soon," said Bruce, "and we'll go together to the Regent."

"But I've no friend in London, except--except a clergyman or two, who perhaps might object, you know."

"Oh, never mind the clergymen," said Bruce; "you shall all come and stay with me at Vyvyan House."

Here was a triumph!--to go to the celebrated Vyvyan House, and that in company with a lord, and to be a partaker of Bruce's hospitality! Of course it would be very rude and wrong to refuse so eligible an invitation. How pleasant it would be to remark casually at hall-time, "I'm just going to run down for the Sunday to Vyvyan House with Bruce and Lord Fitzurse!"

"Let me see," said Bruce, "to-day's Monday; supposing you come to wine with me on Thursday, and then we'll see if we can't manage to get to London from Sat.u.r.day to Monday."

"Thursday--I'm afraid I've an engagement on Thursday to--"

"To what?" asked Bruce.

The more Hazlet coloured and hung back, the more Bruce, in his agreeable way, pressed to know, till at last Hazlet, unable to escape such genial importunity, reluctantly confessed that it was to a prayer-meeting in a friend's rooms.

"Oh," said Bruce, with the least little laugh, "tea and ha.s.socks, eh?"

He said no more, but the little, scornful laugh, and the few scornful words had done their work more effectually than a volume of ridicule.

It need not be added that Hazlet came, not to the prayer-meeting, but to the wine-party. Cards were introduced in the evening, and one of the players was Kennedy. Kennedy played often now, but he certainly did feel a qualm of intense and irrepressible disgust as, with great surprise, he found himself _vis a vis_ with the spectacled visage of Jedediah Hazlet.

"But how shall I get my exeat to go to London?" said Hazlet.

"Oh, say a particular friend has invited you to spend the Sunday with him. Say you want to hear Starfish preach."

Mr Norton, Hazlet's tutor, who did not expect him to fall into mischief, and thought that very likely Mr Starfish's eloquence might be the operating attraction, granted him the exeat without any difficulty, and on Sat.u.r.day Hazlet was reclining in a first-cla.s.s carriage, with Bruce, Brogten, and Fitzurse, on his way to Vyvyan House. A change was observable in his dress. Bruce had hinted to him that his usual garb might look a little formal and odd at a theatre, and had persuaded him to come to his own egregious Camford tailor, Mr Fitfop, who, as a particular favour to his customer Bruce, produced with suspicious celerity the cut-away coat and mauve-coloured pegtops, in which unwonted splendour Hazlet was now arrayed. It was a pity that his ears were so obturated with vanity as not to have heard the shrieks of half-stifled laughter created by his first public appearance in this fashionable guise, which only required to be completed by the death's-head pin with which Bruce presented him, (and which therefore he was obliged to wear), to make it perfect.

The sumptuous and voluptuous richness of all the appointments in Vyvyan House introduced Hazlet to a new world. Sir Rollo and Lady Bruce were not in town, so that the four young men had the house entirely to themselves, and Bruce ordered about the servants with royal energy.

Soon after their arrival they sat down to a choice dinner, and Bruce took care, although the champagne had been abundant at dinner, to pa.s.s pretty freely, at dessert, the best claret and amontillado of his father's cellars. Hazlet was not slow to follow the example which the others set him; he helped himself plentifully to everything, and after dinner, lolling in an easy att.i.tude, copied from Fitzurse, he even ventured to exhibit his very recently acquired accomplishment of smoking a weed. Very soon he imagined that he had quite made an impression on the most fashionable members of the Saint Werner's world.

They went to the Regent, and between the acts, Bruce, who knew everything, introduced them behind the scenes. Hazlet, rather amazed at his own boldness, but in reality entirely ignorant which way to turn, necessarily followed his guides, and, exultant with the influence of mellow wine, imitated the others, and tried to look and feel at home.

Within a month of Bruce's manipulation this excellent and gifted young man, this truly gracious light in the youthful band of confessors, was seated, talking to a fascinating young _danseuse_ who wore a gossamer dress, behind the scenes of a petty London theatre. Bruce looked on with a smile, and hummed to himself--

"Jene Tanzerinn Fliegt, mit leichtem Sinn Und noch leichtern Kleide Durch den Saal der Freude Wie ein Zephyr bin, _etcetera_."

The head of Jedediah Hazlet was somewhat confused, when, after the play and an oyster supper in the cider cellars, it sank deep into the reposeful down of a spare chamber in the gay Sir Rollo Bruce's London house.

The next morning was Sunday. They none of them got up till twelve to a languid breakfast, and then read novels. Hazlet, who was rather shocked at this, did indeed faintly suggest going to church. "Oh yes," said Bruce, looking up with a smile from his Balzac, "we'll do that, or some other equally harmless amus.e.m.e.nt." The dinner hour, however, coincided with the time of evening service, so that it was impossible to go then, and finally they spent the evening in what they all agreed to call "a perfectly quiet game at cards."

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

ONE OF THE SIMPLE ONES.

"I tempted his blood and his flesh, Hid in roses my mesh, Choicest cates, and the flagon's best spilth."

Robert Browning.

"Faugh," said Bruce, on his return to Camford, "that fellow Hazlet isn't worth making an experiment upon--_in corpore vili_ truly; but the creature is so wicked at heart, that even his cherished traditions crumble at a touch. He's no game; he doesn't even run cunning."

"Then I hope you'll p-p-pay me my p-p-p-ponies," said Fitzurse.

"By no means; only I shall cut things short; he isn't worth playing; I shall haul him in at once."

Accordingly, Hazlet was invited once more to one of Bruce's parties-- this time to a supper. It was one of the regular, reckless, uproarious affairs--D'Acres, Boodle, Tulk, Brogten, Fitzurse, were all there, and the elite of the fast fellow-commoners, and sporting men besides. Bruce had privately entreated them all not to snub Hazlet, as he wanted to have some fun. The supper was soon despatched, and the wine circled plentifully. It was followed by a game of cards, during which the punch-bowl stood in the centre of the table, rich, smoking, and crowned with a concoction of unprecedented strength. Hazlet was quite in his glory. When they had plied him sufficiently--which Bruce took care to do by repeatedly replenishing his cup on the sly, so that he might fancy himself to have taken much less than was really the case--they all drank his health with the usual honours:

"For he's a jolly good fe-el-low.

For he's a jolly good fe-el-low, For he's a jolly good fe-el-l-ow-- Which n.o.body can deny, Which n.o.body can deny; For he's a jolly good fe-el-low," etcetera.

And so on, _ad infinitum_, followed by "Hip! hip! hip! hurrah! hurrah!!

hurrah!!!" and then the general rattling of plates on the table, and breaking of wine-gla.s.s stems with knives of "boys who crashed the gla.s.s and beat the floor."

Hazlet was quite in the seventh heaven of exaltation, and made a feeble attempt at replying to the honour in a speech; but he was in so very oblivious and generally foolish a condition, that, being chiefly accustomed to Philadelphus oratory, he began to address them as "My Christian Friends;" and this produced such shouts of boisterous laughter, that he sat down with his purpose unaccomplished.

Before the evening was over, Bruce, in the opinion of all present, including Fitzurse himself, had fairly won his bet.

"I shan't mind p-p-paying a bit," said the excellent young n.o.bleman; "it's been such r-r-rare f-f-fun."

Rare fun indeed! The miserable Hazlet, swilled with unwonted draughts, lay brutally comatose in a chair. His head rolled from side to side, his body and arms hung helpless and disjointed, his eyelids dropped--he was completely unconscious, and more than fulfilled the conditions of being "roaring drunk!"

Now for some jolly amus.e.m.e.nt--the opportunity's too good to be lost!

What exhilaration there is on seeing a human soul imbruted and grovelling hopelessly in the dirt or rather to have a body before you, _without_ a soul for the time being--a coa.r.s.e animal ma.s.s, swinish as those whom the wand of Circe smote, but with the human intelligence quenched besides, and the charactery of reason wiped away. Here, some ochre and lamp-black, quick! There--plaster it well about the whiskers and eyelids, and put a few patches on the hair! Magnificent!--he looks like a Choctaw in his war-paint, after drinking fire-water.

Screams of irrepressible laughter--almost as ghastly, (if the cause of them be considered), as those that might have sounded round a witch's cauldron over diabolical orgies--accompanied the whole proceeding. So loud were they that all the men on the stair-case heard them, and fully expected the immediate apparition of some bulldog, dean, or proctor. It was n.o.body's affair, however, but Bruce's, and he must do as he liked.