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42 A SHABBY GENTEEL STORY
insult was as great as any that could be paid to the painter.
" He's a good creature, too," said Becky, " crack-brained as he is.
Do you know, miss, he gave me half-a-sovereign to buy a new
collar, after that business t'other day ?"
"And did—Mr. _________ ,— did the first-floor say anything?" asked
Caroline.
"Didn't he! he's a funny gentleman, that Brandon, sure
enough; and when I took him up breakfast next morning, asked
about Sims the pilot, and what I gi'ed Sims for the collar and
brooch,—he, he !"
And this was indeed a correct report of Mr. Brandon's conversation
with Becky; he had been infinitely amused with the whole
transaction, and wrote his friend the Viscount a capital facetious
account of the manners and customs of the native inhabitants of
the Isle of Thanet.
And now, when Mr. Fitch's passion was fully developed—as
far, that is, as sighs and ogles could give it utterance—a curious
instance of that spirit of contradiction for which our race is remarkable
was seen in the behaviour of Mr. Brandon. Although Caroline,
in the depths of her little silly heart, had set him down for her
divinity, her wondrous fairy prince, who was to deliver her from
her present miserable durance, she had never by word or deed
acquainted Brandon with her inclination for him, but had, with
instinctive modesty, avoided him more sedulously than before. He,
too, had never bestowed a thought upon her. How should such a
Jove as Mr. Brandon, from the cloudy summit of his fashionable
Olympus, look down and perceive such an humble retiring being as
poor little Caroline Gann ? Thinking her at first not disagreeable,
he had never, until the day of the dinner, bestowed one single
further thought upon her ; and only when exasperated by the Miss
Macartys' behaviour towards him, did he begin to think how sweet
it would be to make them jealous and unhappy.
" The uncouth grinning monsters," said he, " with their horrible
court of Bob Smiths and Jack Joneses, daring to look down upon
me, a gentleman,—me, the celebrated mangeur des cœurs—a man
of genius, fashion, and noble family! If I could but revenge myself
on them ! What injury can I invent to wound them ?"
It is curious to what points a man in his passion will go. Mr.
Brandon had long since, in fact, tried to do the greatest possible
injury to the young ladies ; for it had been, at the first dawn of his
acquaintance, as we are bound with much sorrow to confess, his
fixed intention to ruin one or the other of them. And when the
young ladies had, by their coldness and indifference to him, frustrated
this benevolent intention, he straightway fancied that they