The best ink
for Vanity Fair use would be one that faded utterly in a couple of
days, and left the paper clean and blank, so that you might write on
it to somebody else.
From Miss Pinkerton's the indefatigable Mrs. Bute followed the track
of Sharp and his daughter back to the lodgings in Greek Street,
which the defunct painter had occupied; and where portraits of the
landlady in white satin, and of the husband in brass buttons, done
by Sharp in lieu of a quarter's rent, still decorated the parlour
walls. Mrs. Stokes was a communicative person, and quickly told all
she knew about Mr. Sharp; how dissolute and poor he was; how good-
natured and amusing; how he was always hunted by bailiffs and duns;
how, to the landlady's horror, though she never could abide the
woman, he did not marry his wife till a short time before her death;
and what a queer little wild vixen his daughter was; how she kept
them all laughing with her fun and mimicry; how she used to fetch
the gin from the public-house, and was known in all the studios in
the quarter--in brief, Mrs. Bute got such a full account of her new
niece's parentage, education, and behaviour as would scarcely have
pleased Rebecca, had the latter known that such inquiries were being
made concerning her.
Of all these industrious researches Miss Crawley had the full
benefit. Mrs. Rawdon Crawley was the daughter of an opera-girl.
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