Jennings

“ Just then, Miss Jennings came into the room.
“Haven’t you done breakfast yet?” she said. “Oh, don’t make such confusion in the room, and don’t talk all of you at once.”
“We have something to talk about,” said her brother-in-law. “This child—this monkey of mine, has made her mark in the world already. She has got a pony of her own.”
“I have heard of it,” said Miss Jennings. “You do not intend to be such a fool as to keep it, Edward.” ”

“ Blanchard! Mr. Jennings! Mr. Williams—"
Caroline gazed at him a moment—uttered a shriek which thrilled to every heart with an electric shock, cried, "Oh, sir, save me—you can save me!" and fell insensible into the arms of Franklin.
"Policemen!—off with you!" cried Mr. Blake, with tears in his eyes. "Mr. Jennings, you are a fool! I answer with my life for this young lady. I ran against her in the street. I picked up the lace, and saw her look of astonishment and horror; and heard her exclaim, "ma'ma! let us go back directly!" Go, proclaim to every one in the establishment that she is innocent. ”

“ Mr. Jennings sat at the head of the table, a little giant, diminutive in stature, but with broad shoulders, a large head, and a powerful frame. Opposite him sat Hannah, tall, stiff and upright as a grenadier. She formed a strange contrast to her employer.
"I wonder what made him hire such a tall woman?" thought Carl. "Being so small himself, her size makes him look smaller."
There was a chair at one side, placed for Carl.
"Sit down there, Carl," said Mr. Jennings. "I won't keep you waiting any longer than I can help. What have you given us to-day, Hannah?" ”

“ She took it and wrapped it about her shoulders, shivering. "I've been here all night long, Jennings," piteously, "and I'm so cold!"
"Poor bairn!" exclaimed Jennings, indignantly. He hurried from the room, then returned in a moment, and busied himself making a fire, muttering to himself—"Poor bairn, it's a shame, a shame!" Indiana watched his operations with interest, as she crouched, shivering, on the lounge. "Now, yer little leddyship." He wheeled a large armchair before the fire, and she nestled into it, holding her hands to the flame.
"Pile on the logs, Jennings, pile on the logs. ”

“ General Bullwigg laughed, as strong men laugh, from the stomach, and with a sweeping gesture of his left hand appeared to dismiss a hundred flatterers.
"I have heard men say," said he, "that I was the battle of Aiken."
With an involuntary shudder Major Jennings hastily addressed his ball, swung jerkily, and topped it feebly down the hill. Then, smiling a sickly smile, he said:
"We're off."
"Get a good one?" asked General Bullwigg. "I wasn't looking."
"Not a very good one," said Major Jennings, inwardly writhing, "but straight—perfectly straight. A little on top." ”

“ Jennings, I am very sorry, but the fact is, Mr. Nelson was very angry at Mark, and pledged me not to sell him in the State. You see he was impudent, and you know that can't be allowed at all. I am right sorry, but I dare say I can suit you in one quite as good. There's Hannibal, one of Captain Adam's boys, he is a—
"No matter, I don't want him," interrupted Mr. Jennings; "I am not particular about purchasing this morning. I only wanted him to please my wife; she will be very much disappointed, as she has his wife washing for her, and she will be in great distress at parting with her husband." ”

“ When he goes down to Kenlis now, he always takes care to provide a clergyman to share his duty, and to supply his place on the instant should he become thus suddenly incapacitated.
When Mr. Jennings breaks down quite, and beats a retreat from the vicarage, and returns to London, where, in a dark street off Piccadilly, he inhabits a very narrow house, Lady Mary says that he is always perfectly well. I have my own opinion about that. There are degrees of course. We shall see.
Mr. Jennings is a perfectly gentlemanlike man. People, however, remark something odd. ”

“ Jennings in the pause which followed. "You'd better do it, neighbor Bacon. Nobuddy need know how things stood; they were married in my house—I thought that would be best. You can't live without your girl," he went on, "any more 'n I could without my boy. You'd better—"
The figure at the table straightened up. Under his tufted eyebrows his keen gray eyes flashed from one to the other. His hands knotted.
"Go slow!" went on the smooth voice of Jennings, known all the country through as a peacemaker. "Take time t' think it over. Stand out, an' you'll live here alone without chick 'r child ”

“ He has lived in the only way he could and reach his ends. And he has done something; he knows.”
“Perhaps,” Jennings agreed dubiously, thinking his own thoughts aloud with brutal disregard for her inferences. “What a bloodless, toady existence, sucking in the joys of his paradise! And for what? A few books to be replaced by a new set in another generation, a few epigrams, and a little quivering of his ‘sensorium.’ Better a day in an Indiana town, than a year of that!”
Mrs. Wilbur turned her face away. ”

“ Jones had no more to tell. Poor Mr. Jennings was very gentle, and very kind. All his people were fond of him. I could see that the servant was very much moved.
So, dejected and agitated, I passed from that terrible house, and its dark canopy of elms, and I hope I shall never see it more. While I write to you I feel like a man who has but half waked from a frightful and monotonous dream. My memory rejects the picture with incredulity and horror. Yet I know it is true. ”

“ Every person now complimented Miss Jennings upon having reduced to this situation the terror of husbands, and the plague of lovers: the court was in full expectation of this miracle, and Miss Jennings of a near approaching happy settlement: but in this world one must have fortune in one’s favour, before one can calculate with certainty upon happiness.
The king did not use to let Lord Rochester remain so long in exile: he grew weary of it, and being displeased that he was forgotten, he posted up to London to wait till it might be his majesty’s pleasure to recall him. ”

“ Consequently I didn't quite see Doctor Paul Jennings getting a professional foothold in Major Murray's house, no matter what his personal charm might be.
As it turned out, the personal charm was a matter of opinion. Jennings had the brightest eyes and the reddest lips ever seen on a man. He was youngish, and looked more like a soldier than a doctor. Long ago some Ralston girl had married a Jennings, consequently the cousinship, distant as it was. But, though you can't associate Spain with a Jennings, there was Spanish blood in the man's veins. ”

“ I think it will make me feel a little less strange," was the impulsive answer.
"I will if you'll call me Mary," replied Miss Jennings. "I've just been longing to talk to you all the morning, but there's no dodging Miss Fairbanks' eye; it's always upon you."
"Are we not supposed to speak at all?" asked Faith, who was forgetting to eat her luncheon.
"Oh, yes, we can speak, but not if there are customers waiting. But, tell me, how do you happen to be a packer? You are too old for that kind of work, and quite too clever, I'm sure," said Miss Jennings kindly. ”

“ Jennings,” put in the driver.
“That is pleasant to hear,” said Jennings, with a smile.
“It is true. There are few people here whom you have not befriended.”
“That is what we are here for, is it not?”
“I wish all were of your opinion. Why, Mr. Jennings, when we get a city charter I think I know who will be the first mayor.”
“Not I, Mr. Leach. My own business is all I can well attend to. Thank you for your compliment, though. Carl, do you see yonder building?” ”

“ Then of a sudden came children, till in three years there were three; and Bob [Pg 198] Jennings had to nurse and to wash them as often as not.
Mrs. Jennings at this time was what is called rather a fine woman: a woman of large scale and full development; whose slatternly habit left her coarse black hair to tumble in snake-locks about her face and shoulders half the day; who, clad in half-hooked clothes, bore herself notoriously and unabashed in her fulness; and of whom ill things were said regarding the lodger. ”

“ Vulgar curiosity is always in search of its victims, and Jennings' boast that he had such a ladylike and beautiful woman in his possession brought numbers to the prison who begged of the jailer the privilege of seeing the slave-trader's prize. Many who saw her were melted to tears at the pitiful sight, and were struck with admiration at her intelligence ”

“ Later, as she and Mary waited in the great drawing-room for Lady Drummond, she returned to the subject of Jennings and his grievance.
"He is always bad-tempered when we come to the Court," she said. "For all its grandeur it is not a hospitable house. Jennings will have to go without his tea this afternoon." ”

“ These familiarities making little Jennings forget the part she was acting, after having pushed him away with all the violence she was able, she told him with indignation that it was very insolent to dare—"Ha! ha!" said he, "here's a rarity indeed! a young w——, who, the better to sell her goods, sets up for virtue, and pretends innocence!" ”

“ Jennings shook his head. "Not me, sir. I think he's flying too high, sir. From all they tell me this here Lopez is a terror. I'll be sorry to see Bugg knocked out, but there it is; it comes to all of 'em in time."
"I like talking to you after breakfast, Jennings," said Tony. "You cheer one up for the entire day." ”

“ Wilbur exclaimed.
“Vivian Vavasour does it: that’s why she is so dried up and sallow. Mr. Erard taught me. Every one smokes in the Circle.” She turned to Jennings. “Adela is squeamish. Then she dislikes new habits.”
Jennings laughed appreciatively.
“By the way, Adela, I am going to write Walter to come on next Easter and take me to Rome for the Carnival. That’s the custom in the Circle,” she explained to Jennings. “We take men instead of maids when we travel. It’s lots nicer; you have some one to lug the bags and to run errands. Besides, it shocks people and makes you talked about.” ”

“ Jennings, an artist in her own right, could dress so badly, with such a careless contempt for patterns and colours, in such ill-fitting frocks and dowdy or grotesque hats! Her preference for strident aniline dyes and gigantic stripes and checks in the different [186] articles of her costume looked very like perversity; especially when it was shown that with reference to other persons, in arranging to paint a portrait, for instance, no one, not Mrs. Jennings, displayed such a fine sense of fitness and harmony as Hester exhibited. ”

“ Even then he had so little fear that Jennings and Sam believed there was a party near at hand, though, as it turned out, it wasn’t so.
“As he come out of the bush, he struck across the open plain, with his pony on a [51] sharp gallop, while little Mabel, seeing her father, stretched out her arms agin toward him and begged him to take her home.
“‘Leave him to me,” said Jennings, bringing his Winchester to his shoulder. The redskin raised the child again, but he was just a second too late, for he rolled off his horse with a hole bored through his skull, as dead as dead could be. ”

“ Still another of the picturesque characters with whom I foregathered nightly on the after-deck of the Negros during our stay at Jolo was a former soldier, John Jennings by name. He was an operative of the Philippine Secret Service, being engaged at the time in breaking up the running of opium from Borneo [16] across the Sulu Sea to the Moro islands. Jennings is a short, thickset, powerfully-built man, all nerve and no nerves. Adventure is his middle name. He has lived more stories than I could invent. ”

“ Chase Price, receiver-general of South Wales, who died indebted to the crown, and an ‘extent in aid’ was issued by the crown against Jennings. He was at this time forced to sell his new collections at a loss. About 1792 Jennings came to London, where he resided in the first house on the east side of Lindsey Row, Chelsea. ”

“ The curate, evidently shocked, went away and brought another curate. Then the two together departed, and brought back the rector—Dr. Jennings, one of the Westminster Canons—a most kind and excellent man. I went on as if unconscious of the censorship, the boys exerting themselves all the more eagerly for the sake of the ‘gallery.’ When the hour was up, Canon Jennings took me aside, and in the most polite manner thanked me for my ‘valuable assistance,’ but did not think that the ‘Essay on Man,’ or especially geography, was suited for the teaching in a Sunday-school. ”

“ A Fool and His Money Are Soon Parted
The little tombstones came thick and fast now. The fairway to the seventeenth, most excellent of all four-shot holes, was dotted with them, and it actually began to look as if General Bullwigg or Major Jennings (they were now on even terms) might be the winner.
It was that psychological moment when of all things a contestant most desires silence. Major Jennings was determined to triumph over his boastful companion. And he was full of courage and resolve. They had reached the seventeenth green in the same number of strokes from the first tee. ”

“ Spalding's, but continued his way straight up Haverstock Hill and across the Heath to his own house. Here he got out and handed the car over to the care of Jennings, who came sauntering down from the garage in his usual sombre fashion.
"You can put her away, Jennings," he said, brushing the dust from his sleeve. "If I want anything to-night I shall take a taxi. This perpetual dashing about in high-powered cars is apt to induce arrogance."
Jennings received this statement with an unmoved expression, and leaving him to carry out his instructions, Tony entered the hall. ”