Divers Vanities

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COLLECTION

OF

BRITISH AUTHORS

TAUCHNITZ EDITION.

VOL. 3844.
DIVERS VANITIES. Bv ARTHUR MORRISON.

IN ONE VOLUME. '. -' "

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TAUCHNTTZ EDITION.
By the umo AuOor,
T MEAN STEEET3 , .
OF THE JAGO . . , .

THE GREEN E

D,mi,.=db,GoOlilc

DIVERS VANITIES

ARTHUR MORRISON

[S OP MEAN STREETS," "THE HOLE IN THE WALL," ETC.

COPYRIGHT BDITIQN

LEIPZIG

BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ

•90S.

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MY WIFE.

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"^s,

CONTENTS.

CROSS-COVES.

Paoi

Chance of the Gaue ii

Spotto'3 Reclauation z6

A "Dead 'Uk" 43

The DtsoKDEK op the Bath 59

His Talx of Bricks 74

Teachbk and Taught 90

HEADS AND TAILS.

A Blot on St. Basil iii

One Moke Unfortdnate 121

Inorates at Bagshaw's 115

Rbyuzk the Second 135

Charlwood with a Number ijz

A Poor Bargain 167

Statement of Edward Chaloher 180

Lost Xoioit Jesps 193

t„Coo<ilc

OLD ESSEX.
Thz IxaxsD OF Lapwatkk Hall . .

The Black Baboek

Ihe Toss Hiabt

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CROSS-COVES.

Frbes humains qui apria nous vivez,
N'ayet leg cteurs centre nous endutcis,
Car, a pitii de oous panvres avez,
Dleu en aura plus t6t de vous merds.

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DIVERS VANITIES.

CHANCE OF THE GAME.

The truly great man of business has no business
hours. To lose an opportunity is no less than a crime,
and an opportunity which displays itself in a time and
place of relaxation is none the less an opportunity. It
was for this reason that Spotto Bird found himself ran-
ning his best in Bow Road.

Spotto Bird was not at all the sort of practitioner to
use the Bow Road in the ordinary way of business;
even as he ran in the dark streets, with more pressing
matters to occupy his mind, he was conscious of some
added shade of apprehension from the possibility, not
merely of being caught, but of being caught working in
the East End. But the dock was a red 'un, and the
opportunity undoubted; to be pinched in the Bow Road
merely might well imply loss of caste in the mob, but
nobody need be ashamed to be pinched anywhere for a

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13 DIVERS VANITIES.

gold vatcb, atler all. Not that Spotto had the smallest
intendoii of beiog pinched at all if his legs could save
him.

As a rule he went West for purposes of business,
and worked alone, tike the superior high mobsman that
he was. Theft from the person is a poor trade for the
ordmary ill-dressed tiiief. It needs a scramble of three
to get a watch, which will never bring them a sovereign,
no matter how much it may have cost the loser in the
game, and probably will bring no more than a few
shillings. But a high mobsman like Spotto Bird, well
dressed and presentable, who can work the West End
and get a watch or a pin or the like by his sole skill,
without vulgar violence, does better: his profits are un-
divided, and his prices are higher.

But now the occasion was exceptional. The end of
an evening's relaxation at the Eastern Empire Music
Hall found Spotto, near midnight, strolling along Bow
Road. Something had been happening at the Bromley
Vestry Hall, and a small crowd of most respectable
elderly gentlemen — guardians, well-to-do tradesmen, or
what not — was emergbg from the doors and spreading
across the pavement In the midst of this little press
Spotto Bird found himself squeezed against a most
rotund white waistcoat, in such wise that a thick gold
watch-chain positively scarified his knuckles. From such
a situation there could be but one issue. It was not a

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CHAHCe OF THE GAME. 1$

time for finesse; Spotto Bird hooked liis fingers about
the chain, tore away the lot, and drove out of the crowd
with a, burst

He made across the broad road with a string of
elderly gentlemen after him, and two policemen at the
end of the string; for it chanced that the poUce-stadon
was actually next door. He struck for the nearest turn-
ing, but was almost headed ofl". For a group of men
on the other side of the way saw the chase start, and
broke into a run. They missed him by a bare yard,
and Spotto Bird turned into the dark by-street dear in
front, but hard pressed.

It was a quiet street in ordinary, lined with decent
small houses. Now it was empty and dark ahead, but
loud with shouts and the beating of feet behind the
runaway. Spotto Bird dropped the watch into his
trousers pocket, and spread his legs for the best they
could do. He led down the middle of the roadway,
pardy because it was less hard and noisy than the
pavement, and partly because there was thus more room
to dodge any attempt to intercept him. Here he gained,
and at the nearest comer there was a clear twenty
yards behind him. Beyond this turning he went so well
that he reached the next — which was very near — ere
the head of the chase had well regained sight of him.
Down this new street he ran alone, his eyes wide open

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14 DIVERS VANITIES.

for the next turn, or for some likely refuge or dodging-
place; for the chase was too fast to last

Among the houses on the left he saw a dark arch
— doubtless the entrance to some lane or alley. He
snatched at a lamp-post, swung round it, and darted
into the archway. Within he found a paved yard,
lighted by a dim light at the far end; and he saw at a
glance that here was the end of his ran. For this was
a yard of old almshouses, and there was no way out
but by the arch he had come in at.

The crowd was yelping at the street comer, and
nearing the arch with every yelp. There was nothing
for it but to lie low and let it rush past — if it would,
Spotto Bird turned and sprang for the nearest doorway,
with a design to stand up dose in the shadow in case
the hunt turned into the yard. There was a little pent-
roof over the door, and two brick steps at its foot.
Stumbling on the steps, he reached to feel the dark
door, and pitched forward with his hands on the mat;
for indeed the door was wide open.

It seemed a stroke of luck, if only nobody had
heard. He crept into the entry, rose gingerly to his
feet on the mat, and listened. The shouts and the pelt
of feet came up the street, and the clamour burst with
a sudden distinctness through the archway.

"*Ere! In 'ere!" came a few voices. And while
some of the tramplmg went on up the street, part turned

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CHANCE OF THE GAME. 1 5

aside at the gate. Spotto silently pushed-to the door
before him within two inches of the jamb, and peeped
through the two inches.

Two or three of the pursuers appeared at the yard
entrance and peered about them.

"Nobody 'ere," said one, "No," said another, "it's
only the alms'ouses; 'e wouldn't go there." And they
turned to rejoin the scurry.

It was a long, straggling crowd that still passed
shouting up the street, as though al! Bow had turned
out to the hunt Probably the old gentlemen from the
Vestry Hall were toiling at the tail, and as they could
most readily recognise the fugitive it seemed well to
keep back still a little longer. Spotto pulled the door
wide, and as he did it a loud clang resounded from
overhead. His start was merely momentary, however,
for the stroke was followed by another and another, and
he realised that somewhere in the dark above the alms-
houses a church dock was striking twelve. In some
odd way it turned his thoughts toward the house he
stood in. For the first lime he peered backward along
the tiny passage. It had seemed black enough from
without, but now he could see that it bent by the stairs,
and that the door of the back room, feebly lighted by
a candle, stood open. He took a noiseless step or two
down the passage, and saw that the candle stood on a
deal tabl^ in company with a little loaf or cake and a

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1 6 DIVERS VANITIES.

glass of beer. The room was quiet and tenantless;
probably the resident was gossiping in another of the
cottages. The beer looked very clear and pleasant, and ,
a hard run, with the police dose behind, induces a
peculiar diyness of the throat and tongue — a different
and a worse dryness than that derived from a plain run
with no police. Spotto Bird walked in and reached for
the beer.

As he did so the little cake caught his eye. It was
a pallid, doughy lump, with two sprawling capital letters
impressed or scratched on its upper side — M. H, It
seemed so odd that he paused wilJi the glass in one
hand and lifted the cake with the other. There were
no more marks on it, and it was a dead, leaden mass,
which nobody would dream of eating, Spotto judged,
as he turned it over, at less than five shillings a bite.
He put it down, and took the beer at a gulp. That
was better.

He turned, with the glass still in his hand, and al-
most choked the beer up. For as he faced the door
he saw that he was not alone — that he was trapped.

A girl emerged from behind the door, gazing straigh^.
in his face, and pushing to the door as she came.

"Oh then," said the girl, "it's — it's — there! iff
true after alll!' Her pale face was radiant, and sht;
met him fearlessly, her bands stretched a litUe before
her. "It is true!"

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CHANCE OP THE GAME. t 7

"Oh yes," replied Spotto Bird vaguely, "ifs quite
jTie, o' course!" The shock was sudden, but presence
)f mind was a habit of his trade

"Don't talk loud, or you'll wake mother. We mustn't
wake mother, you know."

Spotto Bird was relieved, though more than a little
puzzled. In the first place he had never seen a girl
exactly like this. She was pale beyond his experience,
with a pallor that seemed unhealthy enough, though it
was scarce the pallor of sickness. Moreover, she re-
garded him with an intensity of interest — even delighted
interest — that he could not at all understand.

"No," he mumbled: "we mustn't wake mother, o'
course;" and he furtively returned the glass to its place
on the table.

"You must come and see her another day," said
the girl. "I'll let yoa know when. When I've broke it
to her a little, you know."

"All right — I'll be sure to come," replied Spotto,
edging toward the door. "I'll bear it in mind, particular."

She laid a hand on his arm. "You needn't run
iway," she sjud, with a sudden archness. "Why, I don't
ven know your name yetl"

Spotto was well resolved that she should not leam
t. "Jenkins," he replied glibly — "W. Jenkins."

"Is it Wilfred?" she asked eagerly. "I tftt love
Wilfred!"

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l8 DIVERS VANITIES.

Spotto made it Wilfred readily, and shuffled a foot.
But now this strange young person had put a hand
on each of his arms, and stood between him and the door.

"Do tell me now, Wilfred," she said: "did you know
you was coming here when you came out? Did you
come all of your own accord or as if you were — a —
sort of drove, you know?"

"Well, yes, I was sort of drove," Spotto admitted
candidly, wondering desperately what it all meant

"You felt a sort of awful great influence that you
couldn't stand up against— that drew you along?"

"Well, yes; there was a good deal of that in it too,
no doubt."

"And you didn't ever see me before, not in all your
life, did you?"

"Well, no — not to say see you, exactly; not what
you might call see you."

"Oh, isn't it wonderful?"

"Reg'lar knock-out, I call it," agreed Spotto fer-
vently, with another uneasy glance at the dotir,

"I was frightened at first— quite awful frightened.
Thaf s why I hid behind the door. And when I heard
you comin' in, ever so sofUy, I was ready to faint. You
see, I didn't know whether it might be really you, alive,
or your ghost walking while you was asleep,"

("Mad," thought Spotto Bird. "Off her bloonung
onion. But all right — quite friendly.")

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CHANCE OF THE CAME. I9

"But o' course when I see you really alive, and turn-
ing the cake and drinking the beer, just like they always
do — why, I didn't mind so much."

"That's all right," he answered. "I'm glad you
didn't mind my 'avin' the beer."

"Why, o' course not. That's what I put it there
for. They always do, you know."

"Oh yes," he assented hastily; "they always do, o*
course,"

"And it Un't Midsummer Eve, after all. And old
Mrs. Crick was so positive it was, too!"

(Now the day just over was October the thirty-
first Quite plainly the girl was balmy — balmy on the
crumpet)

"Was she, though?" Spotto answered aloud. "Silly
old geezer 1 I'll — Pll just go and tell 'er she was
wrong." And he made a more detennined move to-
ward the door.

But the pallid girl gripped him tighter, and pressed
him back. "Why, she's in bed long ago," she said;
"you might know she would be. And SO you know her,
do you?"

Spotto was cautious. "Well, only in a sort o' way,"
he said. "Not what you might call know hra — not in-
timate."

"I thought not, else I must ha' seen you in the
yard. I'm always lookin' out o' window when mother's

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20 DIVERS VANITIES.

asleep, if I ain't readin'. Did you ever hear Mrs. Crick
talking about this?"

"What?"

"Why, this, you know," — with a nod at the table.
"She see her own husbaud that way, over fifty years
ago, when it was all trees and green fields round here.
On Midsummer Eve, she says; but Mrs. Nye says it
ought to be twelve o'clock of All Hallows', and so it is,
you see. I tried Midsummer Eve, and hid there be-
hind the door till past three in the mornin', and day-
light, with the front door wide open, and nobody came
at all. I had to shut the door then, o' course, else
somebody would ha' seen it open."

"Ah — jesso," Spotto assented. A dim light was be-
ginning to break on him. He remembered to have
heard of some such thing as this years ago. Didn't
the women call it the "dumb-cake" or something of
the sort?

"I was afraid perhaps it wasn't true after all," the
girl went on. "But I said nothing to nobody, and I
tried again to-night, as Mrs. Nye said it ought to be;
and now I know it is true — true as gospel. I did it
just as Mrs. Nye said™ made the dough of plain flour
seven nights before, unknown to anybody, and kept it
under my pillow. And to-night I marked it with the
first letters of my name, baked it, and put out the cloth
and the candle and the glass of beer, and opened the

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CHANCE OF THE GAME. 2 I

doors and waited. And when the clock struck twelve
in you came; and you lifted the cake in your hand
and turned it, and you drank the beer — ^just the proper
way!"

"So I did," agreed Spotto Bird. The thing was
dear enough now. This extraordinary girl looked on
him as her future husband, brought to her by this old
woman's spell, Spotto Bird sadly wanted to laugh aloud.
He had his own superstitions, like most of them that get
a living "on the cross." A lucky penny, or a piece of
coal in the pocket, or ceasing "the game" for the day
on meeting a squinting man — these things were reason-
able enough; but as to this! . . . The whole adventure
touched his sense of the comic, and he longed to get
outside and laugh.

"So I did," he said. "But I'd better not stop now.
Your mother'll be comin' down."

"Oh no — she can't," the girl explained. "She's
bed-rid — been bed-rid thirteen years. That's why I
never go out, nor see anybody except Mrs. Nye and
Wis. Crick and the other old ladies in the yard. Mother
won't even let me out of the house, and Mrs. Nye gets
the things in for us. I ain't even got a proper hat!
And I havent been past the arch since I was twdve
years old."

"No?" replied Spotto wonderingly. "Why not?"

"Mother won't let me. Says we'll go out together

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22 DIVERS VANITIES.

when she's better. She never will be better, but we
mustn't tell her so. If she loses sight of me for five
minutes she almost has a iit She hasn't anybody else
in the world but me, you see, so I must do what I can.
But I get very down sometimes, except for reading. Do
you read Home Slop?"

Spotto Bird admitted that he didnt

"It's full of such beautiful tales! Lovely tales! You
ought to read them. Next time you come I'll lend you
some back numbers."

"Thanks," Spotto answered hastily. "I'll come and
see about it I'll bear it in mind, — and — and I'll just
be gettin' along!"

The pallid girl looked at him reproachfully for a
moment, and then dropped her gaze. "Isn't there—
anything — anything else you want to say to me?" she
asked tremulously; and Spotto Bird felt desperately un-
comfortable. "Why," she went on, "you haven't even
asked me my name yet!"

"Well, no," he stammered, "I didn't — you see — I
didn't like to — bein' a bit — you know — a bit nervous;
and Well, what's your name?"

"Martha Hardy," she replied simply, "But I don't
like Martha — I'd like to be called Melissa. Don't you
think Melissa's a pretfy name?"

Spotto Bird expressed unbounded admiration of

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CHANCE OF THE GAME. 2^

both names; but was quite ready to agree that perhaps
Melissa had a bit more style about it

"So you'll call me Melissa, won't you, Wilfred?"
^e said, and watched his nod with wistful earnestness.
"It all seems — seems like a dream, don't it?"

"Praps it is," Spotto suggested sagely. He was
now convinced that the sole expedient was to Idss the
girl and get out on that He had in general no greater
objection to kissing a girl than any other young man of
his age. But there was something odd about this girl:
physically she repelled him, almost as a corpse would
have done; and in other respects she left him puzzled,
uncomfortable — somewhat abashed,

"Oh no, I hope it isn't," the girl replied with
seriousness. "Don't you? Well make sure of it, Wil-
fred. I'll give you a keepsake." She pulled a little
locket out of her pocket. "I put it in my pocket in —
in case," she went on. "It's a bit of my own hair in it
— I put it in a long time ago; just for — fancy, you
know, to-— to pretend to myself. But now it is all quite
real, isn't it? And you'll wear it, won't you? Next
your heart? It is gold."

Well, a gold locket was something — even a little one
like this. "I'll bring you something next time I come,"
he said. "Next — next Thursday."

There came a sudden thump on the floor above
their heads, and three more after it, with the cry of a

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24 DIVERS VANITIES.

thin, peevish voice. Instantly the girl flung wide the
door and called aloud, "All right, mother, I'm coming!"

"You must go now," she whispered hurriedly. "But
be sure to come on Thursday. Come at dusk, and 111
be waiting in the passage. Good-bye!"

Spotto Bird bent quickly and kissed the pallid girl,
thinking, as he did it, of damp wax. Then he hastened
into the yard, while the girl, summoned by more thumps,
cried, "I am coming, mother!" on the stairs. And the
voice had a ring of novel gladness.

Spotto Bird made out through the archway with a
broad grin. The street was empty and still enough
now, and he caught again at the friendly lamp-post and
burst into a quiet fit of laughter. It was quite the most
unprecedented go! So he laughed again, long and
heartily, though with the quietness of cautious habit
Truly the rammiest start!

Presently he turned his attention to the spoils. It
was a poor little locket — gold, no doubt, but with sides
like paper. Nine carat, probably. The watch and chain
was a different matter — thick and sohd; nothing of nine
caraU there. Indeed, quite a good nighfs work, as re-
garded the clock and slang.

He put the watch away and turned the locket over
in his hand. After all there was little enough in that,
one way or another; and there are some things below
a iiigh mobsman's notice. To work in the East End

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CHANCE OF THE GAME. 2$

might be well enou^ for a gold watch. But a thing
like this — well, a man of Spotto Bird's standing must
have some self-respect He turned back into the yard,
dandng the locket in his ha]f-<Josed hand. The cottage
was shut dose and dark now, and Spotto stooped over
the brick steps and felt along the bottom of the door.
The crack was a quarter of an inch wide, and more.
He pushed the locket through, and thrust it as far as it
would go with the blade of his knife.

"Praps she^ fancy it wot a dream now," thought
Spotto Bird, — "a sleep-walking drcaml"

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SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION.

Spotto Bird's reclamation, like a numbn' more of
his adventures, came about through a watch.

It was at a period of some difficulty in Spotto's his-
tory. He had had a bad "fall" — a stretch and a half;
that is to say, in shameless English, he had been im-
prisoned for eighteen months; the most prolonged mis-
fortune of the sort that had yet befallen him. Now, it
is not well to begin "the game" again too soon after
such a release, and that for more than one reason.
Firstly and obviously, of course, the police eye is upon
you, and a fresh conviction just then is looked on with
peculiar disfavour from the bench. But furthermore,
eighteen months with hard labour (and for that term
the living is as hard as the labour) has a ruinous effect
on the professional abilities of so finished a fingersmilh
as Spotto Bird. Like the cultured quickness of the
boxer trained to the hour, like the lightning riposte of
the fencing-master, and like the preternatural spurt of
the nurtured runner, the dexterity of the master pick-
pocket is an artificial product, kept alive by daily prac-
tice, and vanishing utteriy with a month's disuse. And

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SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION. 2?

even that is not all; the seclusion of a year and a half
costs more than touch and training; the practitioner
loses his accustomed nerve; he feels shy in the crowded
streets, and desperately apprehensive of a thousand
eyes.

So it came about that for some little while Spotto
Bird did not "go out" In the common and ordmary
sense of the term he went out frequently, it is true, but
never in the restricted and recondite meaning of the
term — to go in search of professional adventure. Funds
sank low — very low. There was a half-soverdgn gratuity
on discharge from prison, but what was ten shillings to
a man of Spotto's tastes and habits? There were also
a few contributed half-crowns and crowns from friends,
but a sporting attempt to found a financial start on
these ended in disaster, through the pestilent prowess
of the wrong horse. And two of Spotto's most sym-
pathetic and affluent friends were in trouble (trouble =
prison) themselves. Spotto Bird was driven to b^n
the game again.

But it was not easy. On his very first outing he
encountered a certain plain-clothes constable, well known
to him and others in the trade as "Ears." This man's
ears — they were huge ears, splayed outward — had won
him promotion from the uniformed force; not so much
because of their size as because of their quickness,
whereby he had been enabled, unsuspected, to overhear

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28 DIVERS VANITIES.

conversations addressed from one cell to another, and
so acquire information of much use.

No sooner had Spotto discovered a promising litUe
crowd before a shop window — it was in Regent Street
— than he became aware of the presence of "Ears."
There the enemy lounged by the kerb, and Spotto, cold
shivers running between his shoulder-blades, averted
his face and slunk away, hoping — and he thought with
reason — that he had not been observed.

He crossed the roadway, walked a little way down
the less crowded side of the street, and then recrosscd
close by the b^inning of the Quadrant One could
always depend on finding just here, at a comer, a
gaping knot of people, mostly well dressed, and always
' staring at photographs in a window. He knew the
place of old, and judged it an easy spot to begin
with; and, in fact, there were the photographs and there
was the knot of people, absorbed and gaping as ever,
as though they had never left the place since he saw it
last He crossed the pavement and joined the group.
A sealskin hand-bag hung from a fat old lady's wrist
at his right hand, and a man with a possible though
somewhat doubtful breastpin stood on his lefl The
pin was too difficult — and uncertain as to quali^; the
hand-bag was better. But at that moment some instinct,
some telepathic shiver in the back, induced him to look

I

SPOTTO'S RECtAUATION. 2Q

behind him, and there stood "Ears" again, staring fiill

There was no question, this time, of the detective
having seen him. He was watching him, following him,
without a. doubt Spotto Bird shifted uneasily from his
place, and, hands deep in pockets — his own — made
an industrious pretence of great interest in a photo-
graph of the Albeit Memorial. Then he edged away
round the comer and so down the turning, miserably
conscious of being followed by "Ears." This is what
is called in police courts being "kept under observa-
tion," and it is one of the dlscomftnts of Spotto Bird's
profession.

For the rest of the day Spotto avoided crowds,
strove not to look behind him — though the temptation
was sore — and did his best to impart an air of aimless
innocence to his back view. All to little effect; for no
sooner did he begin, next morning, to prospect afresh,
than he perceived that "Ears" was "on" him again.

Spotto Bird's nerves began to suffer. "Ears" seemed
ever behind him, and Spotto wondered why in the
world he had not rather been called "Eyes." It was a
fact that the detective was keeping a particularly close
watch on Spotto, and was asking questions about him
of certain private informers, for he knew Spotto must
soon begin business again; but it was also a fact that
Spotto be^an to see the detective where no detective

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

30 DIVERS VANITIES.

was, and that for Spotto each successive crowd was
fuller of ears and eyes than the last Meanwhile "Ears"
had other business, and others to watch; and there
came two days when Spotto saw him in the flesh not at
all, and even began to grow less and less convinced in
fancy of his baleful proximity; till, on the evening of the
second day, things being very low indeed, Spotto Bird
at last began work again.

He had come along Oxford Street, and he turned
up the detached northern end of Regent Street on the
chance of a meeting at either of the halls, since this
was about the time at which such meetings began. Sl
George's Hall was shut and dark, but there was
a meeting of some sort at Queen's Hall, a small crowd
at the door, and cabs. Spotto was desperate. This
absurd nervousness must be got over somehow, else
starvation faced him — or even work. There were dark
comers here and there, a crowd to hide in, and people
everywhere. On the outskirts of the crowd, and near
one of the dark corners, a man stood intently reading
a newspaper by the light of a street lamp. He wore
spectacles, and had ragged, hay-coloured whiskers and
beard; on his head was a feeble-looking soft felt hat, of
no particular shape, unless it were that of a pork pie
in a saucer, and as he held the paper close before his
face his arms parted his large cloak before him,
revealing, in the light of the Queen's Hall lamps, a

u,mi,.=flt„Cooylc

SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION. 3 1

black watch-ribbon. Now it was Spotto's experience
that a black watch-nbbon was commonly attached to
CDC of two sorts of watches, either very expensive
indeed, or very cheap. Perhaps the man did not look
exactly the person to carry an expensive watch, but
again experience told Spotto that this was a thing you
never could tell. It was a good enough chance.

He glanced about him, and sidled toward the man,
so as to give himself a wide field of observation to the
left, in the direction of the crowd and the lights. First
the riblxm, and then the bow of the watch passed
between his forefinger and thumb, and so, with his little
finger on the edge of the pocket, he hfted the prize
deftly. The man stood still, with his spectacled eyes
close on his paper.

The rest occurred in an instant, though it is slow
to tell. As the watch left the pocket, Spotto felt the
back smooth against his finger-tip, and then was aware
of a certain prominence about the edge. Surely this
was a Waterburyt The suspicion put him to a shade of
pause. It must be a tug and a bolt if the thing were
worth it, and if it were not, then best let the watch slip
back and try farther in the crowd. The moment's in-
decision, the unworkmanlike fumble did it Down
came hands and paper from the man's face, and
Spotto's forearm was grabbed and held.

Spotto tugged and whimpered. In other circum-

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

32 DM

Stances, with his full nerve — before his eighteen months
— he would have knocked the man over with his left.
In his present state he whimpered and pulled.

"You lemme go — I got nothing o' yours — give a
poor chap a chance, guv'nor — I've done nothing, s'elp
me! Let go!"

"Ifs all right!" the stranger answered eagerly. "I
shaat charge youl You're the very man I want to
consult It's most fortunate for both of us, really!
Youll be quite safe, I tell you!"

Spotto ceased to pull, but continued to whine.
"Ifs very 'ard when a man's 'ungty, sir," he pleaded,
"an' if you'd bin through all what I 'ave, you'd "

"Yes, I know," the stranger interrupted; "that's just
what I want to bear about You shall tell me. You're
quite safe, my friend, I assure you."

Spotto took heart again. Perhaps there was more
to be got out of this man than a white-metal watch after
all, and by safer means. But at this moment a shadow
fell on them from the direction of the hall lights, and
behold — it was the shadow of "Ears!"

"'UUol" growled "Ears," with a fierce stare at
Spotto; "what's this? Whafs he been up to?"

"What do you mean?" retorted the man in the felt
hat, dropping his hold of Spotto's arm. "Who are you?"

"I'm a p'hce officer," answered "Ears," "an' I want
to know what this man's been up to."

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION. 33

"Oh, a police officer!" repeated the stranger, with
no less sharpness. "Then this is my friend, and he
hasn't been up to anythingl"

"Oh, you're a pal of 'is, are you?" remarked the
plain-clothes man, turning grimly on the man in the
cloaJc. "Ill just bear you in mind then, me fine feller!
An' now you an' your pal had better clear out o' this,
'fore I make it too warm for you. Come now, just you
pass along, smart!"

Spotto's new friend glared and bridled and b^an
angry threats. But Spotto turned away with a humble
"All right, guv'nor, I'm o^" and the man in the cloaic
was f<un to follow, anxious not to lose him.

"Go on now! Go on!" ui^ed "Ears," sternly, with
a rising inflection, standing erect on the footway to watch
them off.

"And this is what you have to endure habitually,
I have no doubt?" asked Spotto's companion, with in-
dignation.

Spotto admitted that it had occuired before.

"It is an outrage upon sovereign humanity!" his
friend exclaimed. And, in fact, it was not long ere
Spotto discovered that Mi. Bullwinkle regarded "human-
ity" as the one thing worshipful in the universe.

"I was going to the Queen's Hall," he resumed pre-
sently, "to the meeting of the Anti-Shampooing League.
But this will be better, and the Anti-Shampooing prin-

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

34 DIVERS

dple is now firmly established — though I fear on mis-
taken lines. Now, I want you to tell me all about your
complaint — for of course it w a compldnt Crime, of
course, is a disease. You have heard that before, I sup-
pose? "

Spotto shook his head doubtfully. Crime as a dis-
ease was wholly a new notion. But if this old crackpot
had any idea of dosing him — well, it only meant a b<dt
up the first turning.

"What! you have not heard that elementary truth?
What is this talk of popular education? You can read
and write, I suppose?"

Oh yes, Spotto could do both very well Though
he did not mention that it was nothing but a particularly

dexterous piece of writing that first procured But

that was an unpleasant memory.

"You can read and write, and yet have not learned
that crime is merely a disease, a misfortime, to be pitied
and treated lovingly I That is the fruit of this brutal system
of law, and that benighted superstition called religion!
Well, you must realise firmly that crime is a disease, and
that I shall cure you — drive it out of you completely,"

Spotto looked a trifle askance at this promise. But
the street was dark, and his instructor went on.

"You must tell me your symptoms. My name is
Bullwinkle — I am Mr. Samuel Bullwinkle. Of course
you know that name?"

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION. 35

Spotto nearly ruined his chance. He hesitated, and
began: "WeU, sir, I can't quite "

"What?" cried the outraged theorist, stopping full in
his walk. "What?"

And Spotto felt that if "Ears" hove in sight now he
would be given in charge (m the spot So he retrieved
the error with native quickness. "Did you say Daniel,
sir?" he asked.

"No; Samuel — Samuel Bullwinkle."

"Oh, Samuel! Why, of course, sir, — Mr. Samud
Bullwinkle! I thought you said Daniel. I never ex-
pected, of course — why — not the grtat Mr. Samuel Bull-
winkle?"

"I am the Mr. Samuel Bullwinkle," rephed the other
modestly, resuming his walk with stately gratification.
"And I am disposed to take an interest in you," he
added, after a pause. "You must tell me your symptoms
— your whole life. You must come and answer my
questions — every day."

Spotto ventured a dubious cough.

"1 shall pay you, you know," Mr. Bullwinkle pur-
sued. "I shall pay for the information — pay according
to the quah^ and quantity of that information, of course."

Spotto resolved that it should lack neither in quality
nor quantity, if invention could help the matter.

"And I'll cure you into the bargain. Ill undertake
to cure you of your disease — criminality."

3'
u,mi,.=flt„ Google

36 DIVERS VANITTES.

Spotto resolved that he might do his worst in that
respect — at a reasonable price.

"Of course," Mr. BuIIwinkle resumed, stopping again
with sudden concern, "of course I take it you are an
habitual criminal? This is not a mere first attempt,
brought about by pressure of circumstances? You said
something about being hungry, I think."

Plainly, if there were to be money in this adventure
Spotto must be as hardened a criminal as possible. He
grinned quietly. "Well," he said, "you see that split
knew me well enough."

"That split? Do you mean the detective?"

"Yes, the 'tec I know him, too. Known him for
years. I'm just out ttaax eighteen months 'ard, an' 'e
knows it. It's all right; 'twasn't no first attempt"

"Very good, then. If it had been, the case would
have been no good to me. I'd rather have charged you
out of hand, and be done with it. Now I think we will
begin to-morrow, I was so interested to discover you,
that it never struck me that it would be late before we
could reach home. I think I will get back to the meet-
ing, after all. Just Ustea You know now that it is
a disease you are suffering from — this disease of crimi-
naUty, for which the law has so brutally punished you.
You know, also, that I am here to cure you of that
disease. Here is "half a crown and my card. Come
to my house to-morrow at ten, and you shall have more."

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION. 37

Half a crown was very little wool after so much
cty, but Spotto Bird was a philosopher, and reflected
that it was at least better than a dump of bony knuckles
on his collar ("Ears" had eaormous knuckles) and a
charge at Maiiborough Street in the morning. More-
over, there was more in it, it seemed, to-morrow, and
perhaps more still afterward.

Thus began Spotto Bird's memorable month of
honesty, though it was scarcely that Rather it was a
month in which he abandoned irregular thieving for
regular lying on the handsomest scale, at five shillings a
day. For he found that the biggest lies were received
with most favour, and he obliged his patrrm accordingly.

Mr. Bullwinkle lived in a very comfortable house at
Highgate; and one of the first interesting things which
Spotto ascertained about him was that his watch was a
gold one after all. Truly Spotto's Anger-tips must have
grown sadly out of condition to have made the mistake
they had.

Other facts about Mr. Bullwinkle were not to be so
definitely stated, except that he was engaged on a.
voluminous work of philosophy, an incompendious com-
pendium of the universe in the Bullwinkle interpretation,
which remained incomplete by reason of the author's
constant discovery or invention of new "views" on many
things. Religions of quaint design he had favoured and
abolished one aAer another, and now would have none

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

38 DIVERS VANITIES.

of them; food, clothes, and drinks of all sorts he ex-
tdlcd and execrated ftom day to day, forming or join-
ing leagues and associations right and left, and quarrelling
with all of them in turn.

And it was here that, amid the multitude of iMr.
BuUwinkle's principles, the one appeared which remained
unchanging: since ever and persistently he proclaimed
himself a man of peace, quarrelling unceasingly, with
opportunity and with none; and, for a man of peace,
taking the most absorbing interest in any SOTt of row of
anybody else's. Also offering "views" thereupon having
nothing in common except this, that if the row were
between his country and another, his country must be
wrong, and if the row were between an honest man and
a thiet then obviously the thief was a very iU-used per-
son, likewise, such was this peacemaker's sympathy
with rows that if he found a policeman quelling one in
the street he invariably took his number. The one crime
he would never excuse, the sole sin he would prochum
the outcome of sheer depravity, was disagreement with
himself. His published works were contained in a vast
scrap-book, consisting of innumerable letters to the news-
papers. He was ever sedulous to wash a white man
black, and always ready to take the breeks from a
Highlander and make a silk purse from a sow's
ear.

Mr. BuUwinkle's specific for Spotto's infirmity was

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION. 39

nothing very novel after all. It was talk. He told
Spotto his "views" a great many times over at vast
length every time. He impressed it on him, as a sur-
prising discovery of his own, that it would be to the
common advantage of humanity for everybody to abstain
from crime, being confident that if everybody would re-
member that, coupled with the obvious fact that
"humanity" was everything topmost in creation, rehgion
having been abolished by Mr, BuUwinkle, then crime
would cease forthwith. Spotto Bird daily expressed a
good deal of delight in the discovery and its corollary
— quite five shilhi^' worth — and gratified his patron
with astonishing tales of his own past misdeeds — at least
ten shillings' worth, as he often reflected resentfully while
Mr. BuUwinkle embodied them in interminable notes.
For five shilhngs a day was wretched poor pay for a
crook of Spotto Bird's habits: one, moreover, who was
filling out the substance of a great philosophical work
with so much wholly original information. But it was
worth while — for the time. It took him out of sight of
the poUce, and, perhaps, gave them the impression that
he was earning a Uving by regular work. Spotto did
not realise how widely abroad Mr. Bullwinkle was
spreading the tale of the Hfelong criminal he was curing
by his system of abstract secular morality, and of how
he was thereby providing the final and conclusive proof
that the systems of obsolete superstition which were

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

40 DIVERS VANTTtES.

called religions had no longer even the plea of sodal
utility to excuse them.

The adventure lasted a month, and toward the end
of the month Spotto grew restive. His habits were be-
coming too regular for his tastes, and his invention
flagged. True, Mr. Bullwinkle was always ready with
reminders and suggestions, and without his aid Spotto
alone could never have compiled so black a record. Mr.
Bullwinkle seemed to be familiar with more wickedness
than Spotto had ever dreamed of, and some to which
even that willing har would not plead guilty, but pre-
ferred to fling in an extra burglary or so, and retain
some shred of a pickpocket's self-respect For there are
degrees in everything, and Spotto Bird was somewhat
shocked at Mr. BuUwinkle's vile opinion of the humanity
he worshipped.

So that Spotto was tired of Mr. BuUwinkle's secular
morals, and began to r^ard that gendeman, as head
and source of his daily round of ill-paid dissimulation,
with intense dislike. Mr. Bullwinkle, on his part, either
failing to suspect that a thief could also be a liar, or,
more probably, not believing that any liar on earth could
deceive him, regarded Spotto and his improvement with
much complacency. And the fame of the unwitting
Spotto expanded among them that reform, harangue,
meddle, badger, nag, denounce, worry, and take measures.
Here in Mr. BuUwinkle's hands lay the instrument which

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

SPOTTO'S RECLAMATION. 4 1

was to overthrow this and that, and in their place set
up the newer that and the higher this; and great was
the glory of Bullwinkle. As for the instrument, he re-
mained intemaliy sulky, though certain mysterious hints
lirom his mentor awakened his curiosity, and even sug-
gested hope of better things to come. For there was to
be something new — a fresh regimen. The didactic
treatment being complete, they must proceed to the
practical. So the month dragged to its end with
such hopeful alleviation as this assurance could give it.

And on the Saturday of the last week Mr. Bull-
winkle met Spotto at his front door with a beaming
face.

"I have a pleasant annoimcemeot to make to you.
Bird," he said, as he stood in the hall; and Spotto's
hopes rose high. "To-day you begin the second stage
of the treatment, which I have not yet described to you.
Morally, you arc regenerated, of course, and although I
have not told you of it, your course of treatment has
been anxiously followed by many friends, to whom I
have reported it In particular there is a gentleman who
is now waiting in my study to see you, and it is with
him that you complete your transformation by a course
of severe manual work— digging. He has built a house,
and the ground destined for the garden is now a bricky
wilderness, which you are to break up and dig into a
blooming garden. There will be a sort of high moral

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

42 DIVERS VANITIES.

significance in the act, for which you will nevertheless
be paid, though probably at a lower rate than you have
been receiving from me. The gentleman has been greatly

struck by the triumph of my views, and "

At this moment Mr. BuUwinkle was struck also. As
he beamed on bis convert, Spotto's eyes sought the
black watch-ribbon, while his outraged soul rose in-
surgent within him. After this sickening month he
was to be set to wori — hard di^ng— for anything
somebody might choose to pay! And there was the
gold watch, that should have been his a month ago,
flaunting before his eyesl Spotto let fly left and right
together, the lefl on Mr. Bullwinkle's nose, the right on
his watchguard. Spotto's benefactor went over with a
crash, and Spotto sprang out at the door and down
the street at his hardest, with the gold watch in his
pocket at last

D,mi,.=db, Google

A "DEAD 'UN."

BiLLV Wiucs was a person most uncommoDly con-
scientious by nature and habit, and by trade a thief.
He did not take to that trade by choice; no con-
sdcntious person would do it. There were several
other things Billy Wilks would have liked better: a
sleeping partnership in a large bank, for instance — or,
in fact, a sleeping partnership in anything lucrative, —
his conscience told him, would have been far preferable.
But his finer aspirations were cruelly defeated by his
fellowmen, who offered him no bank-partnerships, and
refused in any way even to contribute to his bare sup-
port, except on (X)nditions of intolerable personal exer-
tion.

He had made his attempts, too. He had once
been a time-keeper on buildings- works — a job which
had attracted him by the comparatively passive nature
of its duties. Here he had discovered a kindly means
of increasing the incomes of late-rising bricklayers,
which brought him grateful acknowledgment, by way of
weekly percentage, from the beneficiaries. But a niis-
anthropic employer, abetted by a brutal system of law,

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

44 DIVERS VANITIES,

brought the arrangement to a disastrous end. So that
there was no more honest toil for Billy Wilks; but
such was his r^ard for toil in the abstract that he still
persevered in it vicariously through Mrs. Wilks, who
did what charing she could get, with her husband's
hearty approval. As for himself, he performed his
thieving with the most respectable compunction. He
never removed an unattended bag from a railway sta-
tion, an overcoat from a neglected hat-stand, nor an
armful of washing from a clothes-line, without sad pangs
of commiseration for the despoiled owners; but then, as
he always reflected, he had himself to think about.

It is surprising to consider what a number of things
can' be picked up casually in and about the streets of
London by any consdentious sedcer who gives his mind
to the task; and that, too, with no such great risk. But
the pursuit affords a poor living, or scarce one at alL
The trifles are not always easy to sell, and there is a
sad lack of conscience among them that buy themj
they pay in pence more often than in shillings, and in
pounds almost never. It had never been Billy Wilks's
fortune to touch gold in transactions with these per-
sons, and, the aid of Mrs. Wilks's charing notwithstand-
ing, there came a time when things were very tight in-
deed. It grew plain to Billy Wilks that he must ven-
ture a little beyond the comparatively safe limits which
he had hitherto observed. Had such a thing been

u,mi,.=flt„Cooylc

A "dead "UN." 45

customary in the trade, he would have liked a sleeping
partnership in a handsome burglary.

But active burglars do not give themselves to
partnerships of that sort, and Billy Wilks's prejudice
against risk deterred him from enterprise of too great
boldness. He sought a middle way; he looked out for
a "dead 'un," — one which he could have all to himself.
A "dead 'un," it may be explained, is a furnished
house left to take care of itself.

"Dead 'uns," again, are surprisingly common about
the suburbs of London, at all sorts of seasons of the
year, and particularly in August; but all "dead 'uns"
are not equally convenient to work on, and Billy Wilks
was some little time in suiting himself. But when the
approved specimen was found, as it was before very
long, it was very convenient indeed, and not half an
hour's walk from Billy Wilks's own home at Hoxton.

The "dead 'un" was at Highbury, in fact, the end
house of a row, with a railing before it and a garden
wall to the side street A wholly walled garden was
opposite, so that observation was to be feared from
nowhere but next door — a matter easily provided
against Blinds were down everywhere, and Billy spent
a whole day, with judicious intervals of absence, in as-
suring himself that his "dead 'un" was absolutely life-
less. Pebbles stealthily pitched at windows were his
maia test, though he had others.

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46 DIVERS VANHIES.

It was a "dead 'im" indeed, and a promising
spedmen. Not too large to be reasonably manageable,
but large enough to promise profit; and the back of
this sort of house was apt to be easy worldng. Billy
Wilks left his prey to itself for the night, for he judged
it best to get to work in the morning, and not too
eaily; near midday, in fact For, indeed, a "dead 'un"
is best worked by day if the thing be at all possible.
There is no need of artificial light, which may easily
be seen through windows; also one can work more
quickly and with less noise when all is plain to see,
and at the same time a litUe noise by day is no such
serious matter as by night, when the streets are still
and the policeman hstens. These small matters must
ever be kept in mind by the conscientious parlour-jumper.
So that it was next morning, between the police
■ beats in Gator's Rents, when Billy Wilks set out to
tackle his job. He took a roundabout way, avoided
spots where he might be recognised, loitered in side
turnings, and finally neared the house at about twelve.
The trafflc of tradesmen's carts had quieted, leaving a
favourable hour. He watched the leisurely policeman
walk the length of the road, pause at the end to look
about him, and turn the comer; and then Billy WUks,
his eyes all round his head, slunk through the front
gate and made for a clump of shrubs that partly
blocked the passage to the back garden.

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

A "DEAD 'UN." 47

Down among these shrubs he crouched, and peered
back toward the road. His entry had been unob-
served, so far as he could tell, but it were well to make
certain. So there he stooped and peeped till it was
plain that nothing threatened him worse than pins and
needles in the legs.

Thence behind the house his way was screened from
all eyes, and at the back he found the most convenient
of all back-doors — glazed, with a Uttle square of red
glass at each comer; tucked down, also, by the side of
a flight of steps leading to the first floor, so as to be
wholly invisible from the next house and garden.

He pulled out his knife, and, with a final glance
about the neat UtUe garden behind him, set to work to
cut away the putty that fixed the litUe square of red
glass nearest the lock. He was slow and awkward, and
he hacked the woodwork clumsily, for in truth he was
trembling as he worked. The moments seemed hours,
his little stabs and gashes rang like hammer-strokes,
and his hands weakened and quavered more and more.
Worse than all, there grew upon him first the fancy and
then the overpowering conviction that he was not alone;
that he was watched from behind: that the watcher was
nearing — was close at his back — standing over him.
And yet he dared not look round.

He fumbled a Uttle more, and stopped. He Hfted
his eyes to the main glass of the door, but it was a.

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

48 DIVERS VANITIES.

patterned ground glass, and reflected nothing at all;
nothing of the staling, silent presence that he could feel
behind him. And then as he peered he felt a breath
— an actual, palpable breath on his neck.

The knife fell clattering, and with a gasp of agony
he wrenched himself round and sank against the angle
of the steps. A light breeze stirred the shrubs and the
trees, but the garden stood empty and quiet as ever.
It was fancy — mere nervous panic He had been terri-
fied by a breath of wind.

He wiped his face with his sleeve and reached for
the knife. He was a httJe ashamed, but vastly more
relieved. Nevertheless, when he set to work again, it
was with his left side dose against the door, and his
back to the wall of the steps.

Now his hand was steadier, and soon he lifted out
the little pane between knife-blade and thumb, and laid
it gently on the ground. Was the key left in the lock?
Yes, that precaution, invaluable to the housebreaker, had
been taken. The key turned easily enough, and no-
thing was left but a bolt — at the bottom. Some lucky
chance — a breakage, or the neglect of a servant — had
left the top bolt unfastened, and so Billy Wilks was
spared the further agony of cutting out a pane at the
upper comer. As for the bottom bolt, that gave no
serious trouble. In the same pocket with a screw-
driver and another tool or two, Billy had brought a

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

A "DEAD 'UN." 49

James— -a thing which only the flippant layman calls a
jemmy — and with a hand and arm thrust well through
the opening where the red glass had been, and the
James in the hand, the bolt was easily tapped back and
the door opened.

It was with a catch of the breath in the throat that
Billy Wilks took a final survey of the garden and passed
within the house. All was quiet He closed the door
behind him and stood, listening. The house was so
still that tiny sounds were clear — the drip of water in a
far cistern, and a little creeping click that might have
been cockroaches in a near comer or a mouse high up
in the building. No clock ticked; that meant that the
place must have been untenanted for a week at least
This was a thing that BDly WOks had thought of, lying
awake the night before.

Right and left lay kitchen and sculleiy; before him
rose a flight of stairs; and as he tiptoed up these he
saw that most of the room doors stood open. Now
that he was alone in the quiet house, safe from external
observadoQ, he was easier and more confident; and yet,
though it might have cost him a little more trouble, he
could almost have wished that those doors had been
shut They were so uncommonly like great staring
eyes; and when he banished that image it was only to
make way for the fancy that the doors moved: moved
by inches at the hands of invisible spies.

Diver, y-nilin. 4

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

5P DIVERS VANITIES.

It even needed some resolution to force himself
through the doorway that stood before him on the first
landing. The room was the drawing-room, he judged,
and most of the furniture was covered with drab
wrappers. Venetian blinds were down at the windows,
and he went across and peeped into the street. All was
quiet there; a man went by on a bicycle, and an errand-
boy dawdled past with a basket on his arm and his
eyes on a penny novel. For some Strange reason the
sight of the bicyclist and the errand-boy calmed and
heartened Billy Wilks, and he turned to set about his
business with no more delay.

There was an ormolu dock on the mantelpiece, but
he preferred to take his first chance with more easily
portable things. He pulled the wrappers from the fur-
niture, and so uncovered a little glass show-table, with
silver knick-knacks in it A very gentle application of
the James laid this open and splintered, and in four
minutes the silver toys lay snug in his pockets. He
might have felt a little remorseful at breaking this pretty
furniture were it not for the reflection that people who
would leave such a house unguarded must surely be
insured against burglary. Moreover, he had himself to
think about; and in view of that insurance he felt a
moral — almost a legal — right to do as he pleased.

So he prized open the lid of a little escritoire with-
out considering the polish, and began to open its inner

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A "DEAD 'UN." 51

drawers in the same way. He knew that there were
often secret places in such things as this, as he stooped
to peer into the cabinet-work; aod with that his very
soul sprang up to his eyes and ears at a sound behind
him: a gasp.

At the door by his elbow stood a man, open-mouthed
and staring; and Billy Wilks squealed and sprang like
a frenzied rat The iron james beat down into the
staring face, and again and again. The man went over,
and the iron beat into head and face as he went— the
iron of itself, driven by some unseen power, and taking
Billy Wilks's arm with it, as things happen in a night-
mare. For Billy was nothing but a man in a devilish
dream, with a staring, gurghng face just before his own,
drabbling and spattering red under the iron.

Down went the face and down, till the infuriate
iron beat it into the floor, and the remaining eye was
blotted out and its stare was wholly gone, and the iron
would lift no more. Billy Wilks, puling hysterically,
rolled from off his victim and reached for the door-
handle to pull himself up.

As he rose slowly to his feet, so the cloud of night-
mare began to fall from his senses, slower still. He
knew be had been struggling, fighting to the death, and
not dreaming; but it was with some unearthly thing,
some hobgoblin without a name; the Watcher unseen —
the Presence that lurked behind the open door.
4*

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

52 DIV

But there it lay now, a heap of tumbled, muddy
clothes; and the face that had set him mad with terror
— that staring head, was battered wide and shapeless
and bloody. Billy Wilks's faculties were clearing fast
He reached out tentatively with his foot and pushed at
the leg that lay uppermost It slid limply off the other
and lay like an empty rag. Billy Wiiks leaned with his
shoulder against the door's edge and laid his head
against the door. He took three great heaving breaths
and broke into a shaking fit of tears.

The thing was real: present He had killed a man.
The poor, hammered, smashed object at his feet had
been a living, reasonable man a few minutes back, a
better man than himself. And now —

Billy Wilks had never even knocked a man down
before. He was no fighter. He could never have sup-
posed that a man was killed so easily. Indeed, even
now, with the evidence of his waking senses before him,
he could scarce realise that he had done it In a httle
while his sobs subsided, and he found himself still lean-
ing against the door edge and starii^ dully into space
beyond the laading.

He shuddered and lifted his head; and before he
could look about him there came, like a hurricane to
blow him along, the impulse of self-preservation. He
stumbled over the prostrate figure, across the landing
and down the stairs. The back door, which he had

ii,mi,.=flt„ Google

A "DEAD 'UN," 53

shut. Stood Open. He ran toward it, but stopped short
on the mat The open world was worse than the shut

To escape, he must first think. A gardener's wheel-
barrow stood near the door, with rakes and hoes in it.
This was the explanation then. The jobbing gardener's
half-day was due that afternoon, and the man had called
to leave his tools on his way home to dinner. Doubt-
less he had tried the door — perhaps noticed the missing
pane. Clearly the door should have been locked again.
Oh, if the door had only been locked!

Billy Wilks closed it now, but still did not lock it
He went slowly upstairs again to the drawing-room.
He found himself wondering, in a vague way, why he
was not afraid to go back there, as he would have ex-
pected. But, indeed, that now seemed to be the one
room in the house he dared enter. To pass another of
those doors — open and staring, or ajar and peeping —
no. He stepped hurriedly over the dead man and
peered once more between the sheets of a blind.

All was well; there was no curious knot of people
staring at the house, no policeman in the front garden,
as he had half expected to see. There had been no
great noise, then — he had been wondering if there had
been any noise. He recrossed the room, bending double
again. That was because of the looking-glass over the
mantelpiece.

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54 DIVERS VANITTES.

There was a little blood on his hands — not much.
He wiped it off carefully on the dead man's clothes.
There was none on his own things, but he wiped his
boots long and thoroughly on the thick carpet, in case
he might have stepped heedlessly. So far instinct car-
ried him, helped by a mere shadow of thought. And
then he sat in a chair and wept again — more wildly
and freely than before, loUing his head on his hands in
anguish.

For now the panic, the numbness, the spurring of
instinct were gone, and the sense of his crime fell on
him like an avalanche. The man's wife and children
were waiting for him — wondering why he was late at
dinner. And here was the husband and father, beaten
out of the shape of man, with not a feature they could
know again. The murderer beat his hands on his head
as he thought of it He — he himself had made what
lay before him of the face that the wife would kiss no
more; had driven the life from the knee that the chil-
dren would never climb again; from the hands that
never more could feed them. This thing, this woe of
orphan and widow, was what he had made of an honest
man, a better man than himself

Himself. Yes, he saw himself now for what he was;
coward, thief, vermin. All his elaborate excuses to him-
self, all his consdenlious scruples — mere fraud over
fraud. He had never been honest even to himself

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

A "DEAD 'UN." 55

from his mother's knee. And here he stood at last, at
the gallows foot For it was that — that and no less;
and the sooner the better. For to Uve and endure the
agonies of the hunt, to live in this remorse, and to be
tracked down, nearer and nearer till the end: that were
to make the gaJlows loom the blacker when he came to
it, as come he must.

The way, then, was dear. An end of all. If he
could not wipe out the past, could not cancel the horror
of the hour now past his reach, he could at least give
himself to just punishment — the punishment that there
was no escaping. He would give himself over to the
law and cut the Ugl^ knot of his life.

He stood up, with a clear mind, and a strange, al-
most a pleasant, serenity of soul. But first the silver
in his pockets. One sin, at least, was not beyond repair.
He pulled the trinkets out one or two at a time, as they
came, and piled them on the glass of the broken show-
table, standing erect before the looking-glass to do it
Then he turned and stepped over the dead man for the
last time, treading in the dry places; for now the thing
repelled him as it had not done before. He went
heavily down the stair, out into the garden, and so
openly into the street

The street was quiet as ever — he had diosen it for
quietness. A boy, with hands in pockets, went dancing
and whistling away at the far end, and a man had

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56 DIVERS VANITIES.

humped his shoulders in a gateway to light his pipe.
Billy Wilks turned the corner by the gate.

It was now for the first time that he thought of his
wife. He would go home first to give her the few cop-
pers in his pocket, and bid her good-bye — her and the
child. There was a sudden, palpable blow at his heart
as he remembered the child, a rise in his throat and a
twitch at his mouth.

But he walked on, seeing little or nothing, falling, as
he went, into something like a brown study, and taking
his way by habit. One who knew the neighbourhood
could approach Cator's Rents from behind, by paved
alleys, dark archways, and paths between dead walls.
It was Billy's custom, in fact, since he often had reasons
for keeping his home-goings private and unobserved;
and the last alley came out under the house he lived
in, so that it was possible to enter by a little gate in
the backyard fence. So by habit Billy Wilks followed
these byways, and came at last to the ragged wooden
gate.

He pushed it, hut found an unaccustomed resistance,
and from between the pales came a yelp of childish
laughter.

"Tan't turn inl" piped a small voice, and as Billy
looked over the gate he saw the muddy little face of
his child raised smiling toward his, and the familial
mop of ragged hair over it,

i,.i... ,.,Gt.)oylc

A "DEAD 'UN." 57

He reached and lifted the child in his arms. Nobody
else was in the squalid yard, and Billy crept quietly in
at the back door and gained his room <»i the first floor.

The child clung at his neck and patted his fac«
with grimy httle hands. Tears and dirt in successive
smears were the daily cosmetic of little Billy's face, and
to-day the mixture was thick and black, though now he
smiled through it alL Billy put the child down on the
tumbled bed, pitched his hat into a comer, and threw
off his coat and waistcoat: habit again.

He remembered, now, that his wife had gone char-
ing, and would not be back till ereoing. Wdl, it could
very well wait till then.

The child scrambled off the bed and pulled open
the door at the sound of footsteps descending from
above. It was Nuke Fish, from the next floor.

"Oieer 01" said Nuke, as he passed the door,
glancing at Billy Wilks's shirt and braces. "Ain't seen
you al! day. On'y jist up?"

"Ab, yus," Billy responded deUberately. "I've been
'avin' a turn in bed to-day."

"Ah — I could do with a day in, meself. Missis out
on a job?"

Billy nodded.

"Ah — she's the sort You can 'ave a bit of an
'oliday with a wife like 'er. So long!"

Billy Wilks pushed the door to, and took little Billy

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58 DIVERS VANITIES.

OD his knee. He must think over that idea of going to
the police; things began to seem different when he
looked at little Billy. It was rather a piece of luck,
Nuke Fish coming down tike that, and assuming he
was only just out of bed. It gave him time to think
things over. More, Nuke would be able to swear he
saw him getting up, or at any rate dressing, at — what
was it? Two o'clock or so — if — yes. . . .

He leaned aside and looked out of window. A
policeman was turning into the Rents at the far end.
He knew the policeman very well, — this was his regular
beat Billy put the child down, pushed up the window,
unbuttoned his shirt, and leaned out, with his elbows on
the sill. He yawned wide and long as the policeman
drew near, stretched an ann in the air, and brought it
back to the dll. The policeman looked up.

Billy nodded quickly. "Good morning, sir," he said
cheerfully, . . .

AAer all, what was done was over, and at least one
could refrain from making it worse. And when he ccoi-
sidered little Billy

Besides, a man bad himself to think about.

So that Billy Wilks was hanged for quite another
murder after all.

ii,mi,.=flt„ Google

THE DISORDER OF THE BATH.

Snorkev Timms is as disreputable an acquaintance
as a man need seek, and full of the most ungenteel
information.

It was from Sncntey's report that I was able long
ago to tell the tale of the Red Cow Anarchist Group;
and it was long after that time that I learned, by
' chance, that he had a surname at all. Not that he had
been christened Snorkey; his original given name I can-
not tell you now, and it is quite possible he has forgotten
it himself; while even "Timms" has so far gone out of
use that you may shout it aloud without attracting
Snorkey's notice.

It was Snorkey, furthermore, who told me the real
story of the attempt on the Shah of Persia's jewelled hat
in open London; as well as many others, more credible
and less, of the doings of them that live by trades of
no respectability. He told them behind bar-screens and
in remote snuggeries, not without interruption &om thirst
and its remedy.

"I s'pose," SMd Snorkey thoughtfully, on one such
occasion, "I s'pose such a party as yourself might 'ave

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6o DIVERS VANITIES.

as much objections as what another party might 'ave,
for to say what 'is line o' business might be?"

Such objections were familiar enough, for good
reason, among Snorkey's acquaintance, and he plainly
anticipated my reply. I signified my entire agreement
with Snorkey's supposition.

"Urn!" he answered, and meditatively licked the
cigar by the gift whereof I had sought to avert the
fumes of Snorkey's shag. "Um — m — m!" He leaned
back on the snuggery bench, put the cigar in his mouth,
and reached for a light. "Vou ain't one of our mob,
any'ow," he proceeded, "an' I know you ain't a nark;
I'll give ye that much credit. But I 'ave 'eard o' parlies,
same as it might be you, as is come down to the Ditch,
or the Kate, or the Gun, same as you might be here,
and got a-talkin' with other parties, same as it might be
me, an' 'earin' about all sorts o' things, an' then writin'
'em in the papers, an' gettin' paid for it — pecks o'
money: about a bob a word. Gettin* it all out o' other
parties, an' then smuggin' the makin's."

"Disgraceful," I said.

Soorkey pushed back a sadly damaged bowler hat
and looked fixedly at me. Then he took a drink, wiped
his mouth, tugged his grimy neckerchief with a hooked
forefinger, and stared again at his cigar. I remained
silent and contemplative.

"Not as you ain't bin pally, now an' then," he re-

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THE DISORDER OF THE BATH. 6 1

sumed awkwardly, after a blank pause. "Standin', an'
all that; an' you greased my duke more'n once; I'll
give ye that much credit" And here Snorkey's speech
tailed off into inarticulate mumblings.

"Out with it," I said. "You waat something. What
is it all about?"

"I'm a-savin' up a bit for a 'oliday in the country,"
he answered sulkily, evading noy eye,

"In the country?" I asked doubtfully; for the phrase
is a euphemism for a convict prison.

"I mean the real country; not where the dawgs
don't bite. I want a bit of a 'oliday,"

I judged that there must be some other reason than
that of health for this aspiration of Snorkey's, and I
said so.

"Well, some parties mightn't call it reasons of 'ealth,"
Snorkey answered. "I should. Ginger Bates'll be out
in a day or two, an* Joe Kelly too — both tagethex-"

I knew that Ginger Bates and Joe Kelly had ex-
perienced the misfortune, some months more than two
years back, to be sentenced to three years' penal ser-
vitude. By the ordinary operation of the prison system,
with prudence and good luck, they must soon be re-
leased. It seemed clear that Snorkey had some par-
ticularly good reason for not wishing to meet these old
friends, fresh from their troubles.

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62 DIVERS VANITIES.

"What's this, then?" I said. " Fou haven't been
narking, have you?"

"Me? Narkin'?" Snorkey glared indignantly; and
in fact the sin of the informer was the sole transgression
of which I could never really have suspected him. "No,
I ain't bin narkin'. 1 ain't bin narkin', but I don't want
to see Ginger Bates an' Joe Kelly when they come out
— not both on 'em U^ether, any'ow. After a week or
two they'll split out after other things, an' it won't matter
so much; but when they fust come out they'll be to-
gether, an' the fust thing they'll do, they'll ask after me.
I don't want to be at 'ome just then,"

"Why?"

"I 'spec' they'll be angry. Matter o' perfessional
jealousy." Snorkey chuckled and winked. "It was a
bit of a lark, an' none so bad a click, neither — double
event. But are you goin' to grease my duke?"

This rite — nothing more nor less than the passing
over of a contribution to Snorkey's holiday fund — was
acccHnplished with no more delay; and fresh interest
was given to Snorkey's empty glass.

"It was none so bad a click," repeated Snorkey:
"quite a lucky touch for a chap workin' alone, like me.
It was when I came 'ome in that dossy knickerbocker

suit,"

I had faint memories of cryptic "chaff" directed at
Snorkey by his intimates in the matter of a certain

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V THE BATH. 63

magnificent walking-suit, anayed in which he was said
to have dazzled Shoreditch at some indefinite period of
his career. But I waited for explanations.

"Ginger Bates and Joe Kelly 'ad got their eye on a
nice place in the country for a bust," Snorkey pro-
ceeded; meaning thereby that his two friends had in
view a burglary at a country house. "It was a nice
medium sort o* place, not too big, but well worth doin',
an' they got me to go down an' take the measure of it
for a few days, them not wantin* to show theirselves in
the neighbourhood, o* course. So they gives me a quid
for exes, an' a few odd sheets o' glass in a glazier's
frame with a lump o" putty an' a knife on it, an' I
humps the lot and starts. 0' course I was to take my
whack when they'd done the job. Nothin' better than
the glazier caper, if you want to run the rule over a
likely place. Buyin' bottles an' bones does pretty well
sometimes, but you don't get the same chances.

"It was very nigh two hours' run out on the rattler,
an' then a four-mile walk; very good weather, an' I put
in a day or two doin' it easy in the sun.

"The 'ouse was a fiist-rate place — quite nobby. I
had a good look at it from outside the garden wall, an'
I asked a few questions at the pub an' what not After
that I went in by the back way, with my glass on my
back; an' I had luck straight away, for I see a pantry

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64 DIVERS VANTTtES.

winder broke. So I 'ad a good look round fiist, an'
then I went along, very 'umble an* dvD to everybody,
an' got the job to mend that winder. More luck.

"They let me do the winder — me offerin' to do it
cheap, — an' so I sets to work steady enough, with a
slavey comin' to pipe me round the comer every now
an' then, to see 1 didn't pinch nothink. An' o' course
I didn't 1 behaved most industrious an' honest, an'
you might ha' made a picture of me, facsimiliar, to go
in front of a bloomin' tract, an' done it credit, too. But
while the slavey was a-pipin' me, I was a-pipin' the
pantry — what ho! I was a-pipin' the pantry with my
little eye, and there was more bloomin' tuckj for if ever
I see a wedge-kip in all my nach'ral puff, I see one fine
an' large under the shelf in that bloomin' pantry! The
luck I 'ad all through that job was jist 'eavenly."

Heavenly might not have been the appropriate word
in the strictly moral view, but since by the "wedge-kip"
Snorkey indicated the plate-basket of the unsuspecting
householder, I understood him well enough.

"It was jist 'eavenly. I never 'ad sich luck before
nor since. So I finished the job very slow, an' took my
money very 'umble, an' a glass o' beer as they sent
out for me, an' pratted away to the village an' sent off
a Uttle screeve by the post, for Ginger an' Joe to come
along to-morrer night an' do the job peaceful an'
pleasant Vou see the new put^ I'd put in 'ud peel

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THE DISORDER OF THE BATH. 65

out on yer finger, an' it on'y meant takin' out the pane
an' openin' the catch to do the job.

"Well, I put up cheap at the smallest pub, an' in
the momin' 1 went out for a walk. Bein' a glazier, ye
see, 'twouldn't 'a' done for me not to go on the tramp
like as if it was after a job. So off I went along the
road, an' it was about the 'ottest stroll ever I took. It
was a 'ot day, without any extrys, but you dont know
what a 'ot day's like till you've tramped in it with the
sun on yer back, an' two or three thicknesses o' winder-
glass for it to shine through. I took the loneliest road
out o' the village, not wandn' to be called on for an-
other job, an' not wantin' to be seen more'n I could
'elp. It was a 'orrid long lane, without a soul or a
'ouse on it for miles, an' I got 'alf frightened after a bit,
thinkin' there never was goin' to be a pub. It seems
unnach'ral an' weirdlike to be on a road with no pubs
—the sort o' thing you dream about in nightmares.

"Well, I went along this 'ere lane with no tumin'
till I was ready to drop, an' I could smell the putty a-
frizzlin' in the frame be'ind me; me a-wonderin' what-
ever the lane was made for. Not for traffic, I reckon,
for there was places with grass 'alf across it, an' other
places where some ijiot 'ad chucked down long patches
o' stones for to repair it, an' the stones was washed
dean with years o' rain, but not a wheel-mark on 'em.
I didn't know whether to turn back or go on, not

Divtn Vaniliti. S,-, .

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66 DIVERS VAKITIES.

knowin' which meant the longest job; till at last I
b'lieve I'd 'a' ate the bloomin' putty off the frame, if I'd
'ad anythink to drink with it. But even the ditch was
a dry 'un, an' I was in that state o' roastin' torment, I
almost think if there'd been a pond or a river I'd 'a'
took a bath, I was that desp'rit

"It was like that when I came to a pub at last It
wasn't much of a pub, bein' mostly pigsties, but it was
good enough for me. There was beer there, an' bread
an' cheese, so I sat on a bench under a tree in front,
an' took an hour or two's rest An' the 'ole time not
a thing or a livin' soul come past, except towards the
end, an' then it was a van — a carryvan, ye know, stch
as gipsies an' showmen 'as — a carryvan for Uvin' in,
with muslin blinds an' a little chimney-pipe. It's a sort
o' thing you gen'rally see a purcession of together, but
this was all alone. There was a steady-lookin' ol' bloke
a-sittin' in firont drivin', an' as the van came opposyte
the pub there was a rare 'ullabaloo o' shoutin' inside it,
but the ol' chap drivin' didn't take no notice. Then a
bloke come flounderin' an' hoUerin' out o' the back door,
an' runs up alongside shoutin' to the ol' chap to stop,
till he ketches 'im by the elbow, an' very nigh pulls 'im
off the van. Then the ol' bloke looks round innocent as
ye please, an' pulls up; an' it turns out that 'e was
stone-deaf, an' what the other chap was after was to
pull up 'ere an' get some water. 'E was a rare tolt

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THE DISORDER OF THE BAIH. 67

this chap — knickerbocker suit an' eyeglass — quiteadook.
It seemed this was 'is way o' takin' a quiet 'oliday, goin'
round the country in a van. I've 'eard of others doin'
the same, since. Not altogether my idea of a 'oliday,
but a sight better'n 'umpin' a glazier's frame for miles
an' miles along a road with no pubs in it,

"Well, they goes an' fetches their water, an' a pre-
dous large lot they seemed to want They brought it
out in pails an' cans, an' poured it into somethink in
the van, which made me s'pose they'd got a tank there.
I might ha' gone an' 'ad a look, but I was sittin' nice
an' comfortable under the tree an' didn't want to get
up. So when they'd got all the water they wanted, they
started off again. It was a very tidy 'orse in front, but
I'd 'a' guessed the van was an old 'un, painted up. It
was a good big long van, but the wheels was a-runnin'
like the numbers on a clock — all Vs an' X's,

"Soon after they went I began to think about movin'
meself. At a place hke that a visitor must 'a' bin a sort
of event, even a glazierj an' I wanted to look as genuine
as possible, so I guyed off the same way the van 'ad
gone. I meant to slide off by a cross turn, or across
the fields, an' get back to meet Bates an' Kelly by dark.
But it was pretty open sort o' country, so I went a good
bit o' way before I began to think about puttm' on the
double. I come over a bit of a rise, which was all loose
stones with grass growin' atween 'em, an' was a-takin' a

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68 DIVERS VANITIES.

look round to find a easy way 'cross country, when I
'ears a most desp'rit sorrowful 'owl. I looks down Ihe
'ill, an' there I see somethink a-movin' in the ditch, h"ke
a — like a — well, more like some sort of a bloomin' shell-
fish than anythink else, or a tortoise — a tortoise more'n
a yard acrosL I took a step or two, an' there came
another yell, an' I could see a man's 'ead stickln' out
from under the shell, singin' out at the top of Is shout
So I starts a trot, an' presently I see it was a sort of tin
enamel thing the bloke was under, an' then — s'elp me!
— s'elp me never! blimy if it wasn't the toif out o" the
canyvan, staric naked as a little coopid, 'idin' under a
bloomin' 'ip-bath — you know, yaller tin scoopy-shape
thing — 'idin' in the dry ditch under a 'ip-bath, an'
singin' out to me to 'urry up I

"So I 'urried up, an' 'is language was pretty sparky
for a toff; an' no error. But when e' told me what was
up — larf! Lord! it was <Mi'y 'cos I remembered the
winder-glass be'tnd me that I didn't go smack down on
my back an' roll! Larf! S'elp me, I laifed till it 'mt
me all overl

'"I've fell through the bottom o' my van,' sez 'e,
Tve fell through the bottom o' the dam' thing in my
bath! An' my man's as deaf as a post,' sez 'e, 'an' 'e's
gone on without mel An' I couldn't nm after Im over
these 'ere dam' flints 1 Don't stand there laughin' hke a
maniac,' sez 'e — 'go an' slop 'iml'

u,mi,.=flt„Cooylc

THE DISORDER OF THE BATH. 6g

"Well, I never 'ad such a paralysed, chronic fit in
all my puff! I'd 'a' give a tanner for a lamp-post to
ketch 'old of an' 'ang on to, s'elp me! I jist 'owled an'
staggered, an' the toff under the bath, 'is language got
sparkier every second, till you'd 'a.' thought no patent
enamel could 'a' stood the 'eat

"'If you ain't as big a fool as you look,' sez 'e, 'go
after that van an' earn a sovereign for yerself! PU give
you a sovereign if you'll lend me your coat an' fetch
back that infernal van so that I can get at my
clothes ! '

"So I steadied a bit when e' offered to spring a
quid, an' I climbed out o' the slings o" the glass-frame,
an' shoved it in the ditch. Then I pulls off my old
coat, an' blimy, 'e snatches it as though it was jewelled
sealskin, an' worth five 'undred quid; an' there wasn't
another soul in sight, neither, nor likely to be. An'
then I 'oofs it off in my shirtsleeves at a trot after the
van.

"I dunno 'ow far I trotted 'fore I caught sight of it,
but it pretty nigh knocked me out — what with runnin'
an' sweatin' an' blowin', an' bustin' out a-Iarfin' 'tween
whiles. The job seemed worth a good deal more'n a
quid, an' by the time I see the van in Iront I'd made
up my mind to try if I couldn't make it pay better.

"Well, I rounded a bend, an' there was the carry-
van at last, goin' along easy as though notbink was

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

70 DIVERS VANITIES.

wrong, an' I put on a extry spurt It was no good a-
callin' out, o' course; an' what was more, I didn't mean
to do it No; I legged it up be'ind the van, an' I
jumped up on the footboard an' opened the door. It
was a snug crib inside, an' I see the toff 'ad bin a-doin'
'isself proper. But the floor! It was two-penn'orth o'
firewood, an' dear at that! Now it was broke, you could
see it was wore thin as a matchbox down the middle,
an' pretty rotten for a man to stand on alone; but
when it come to a man an' a bathful o' water tt^ether,
joltin' down that stony 'ill — what ho!

"But I'd got no time to waste on the busted floor.
There was the fine new knickerbocker suit, an' a port-
manter, an' a nobby kit-bag, an' fishin' rods, an' a
photoin' camera. The portmanter was too big, so I
slung the suit an' the camera into the Ht-bag an'
dropped out be'ind. The steady ol' dummy in front
just went on like a stuck image. 'E'd 'a doddered on
through a bloomin' earthquake so long as it didn't knock
'im off" 'is perch.

"I guyed it back round the bend an' opened the
kit-bag. There was a tidy watch an' chain in the
jacket, an' a sovereign-purse on the chain, with nine
quid in it. So I got be'ind the 'edge, an' just wrung
out o' my old clothes an' into the dossy knickerbockers
in no time. Then I 'ung the old things on the 'edge,
for anybody as might want 'em. I wanted the kit-bag

— u,mi,.=flt„ Google

THE DISORDER OF THE BATH. 7 1

for somethiog else — 'cos I'd got a fresh idea. Some'ow
a bit o' luck like that always gives me fresh ideas.

"I dotted back the way I'd come, meanin' to go
wide round 3 field when 1 come to where I'd left ol'
cockalorum with the bath. But after a bit I topped a
little rise, an' there I see 'im comin' along the road, 'alf
a mile off! There 'e was, all alone in the world, with
my old coat tied round the middle of 'im an' the bath
on 'is 'ead, 'oppin' along tender on a little strip o' grass
by the road, like a cat on broken bottles atop of a
garden wall! If on'y 'e'd 'a' 'ad the frame o' winder-
glass on 'is back I could 'a' died 'appy, but 'e'd left
that where 1 put it Showed 'ow much 'e considered
my interests, as was supposed to 'a' left it unpertected
to do 'im a service! You wouldn't think a toff 'ud be
so selfish.

"I 'ooked it through a gate an' waited be'ind a
'aystack while 'e went past, an' a precious while he was
a-doin' it, too, gruntin' an' cussin' to 'isself; me, with 'is
clothes on me, a-lookin' at 'im, an' 'im too wild an' too
tender in the feet to notice anythink but the ground 'e
was treadin' on. I was sorry for the pore bloke, o"
course, but then a chap can't neglect business, can 'e?
An', besides, I felt sure 'e'd find my of duds on the
'edge presently,

"So I guyed off as soon as I could to the place
where I put in the pantry winder, an' I took the winder

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

72 DIVERS VANHTES.

out again just after dusk an' did the show for 'alf the
wedge in the kipsy — spoons an' forks in my pockets, an'
the rest in the kit-bag: all I could carry. That was my
new idea, you see. Then I come through the shrubbery
an' out the front way, an' at the gate I met the very
slavey as was pipin' me while I put in the pantry winder!
She looked pretfy 'ard, so I puts on a voice like a
markis, an' 'Good evenin'!' I says, very sniffy an' con-
descendin' as I went past, and she says 'Good evenin',
sir,' an' lets me go. Oh, I can do it sossy, I tell ye,
when I've got 'em on!

"I went all out for the station, an' caught a train
snug. I see Ginger Bates an' Joe Kelly comin' off from
the train as I got there; but I dodged 'em all right, an'
did the wedge in next day for thirty quid an' twenty-
five bob for the photo-camera — ought to 'a' bin more.
An' so I pulled off a merry little double event, I never
'ad sich a day's luck as I 'ad that day, all through. It
was 'eavenly!"

"And is that all you know of the affair? " I asked.

"All that's to do with me," replied the unblushing
Snorkey. " But the toff with the van, 'is troubles wasn't
over. 'E was in the papers next day — locked up for
'ousebreakin'. It seems they missed the stuff out o' the
plate-basket soon after I'd gone, an' the slavey that
piped me goin' out gave a description o' me in the
oobby tweed suit, an' somebody remembered seem' jist

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

THE DISORDER OF THE BATH. 73

sich a bloke go pa.st in a. carryvan. It made a fetchin'
novelty for the 'a'penny papers — 'Gentleman Burglar
IN A Travelung Van,' especially when 'e was found
di^uised as a glazier in my old clothes, an' 'is frame o'
glass discovered concealed in a ditch. That did it
pretty plain for 'im, you see. 'E'd turned up first like
a glazier, and reconnoitiered, an' then 'e'd come dossed
up to clear out the stuff. Hain enough. It was quite
a catch for a bit, but it didn't last — the rozzers 'ad to
let 'im go. But they didn't let Ginger Bates an' Joe
Kelly go, though — not them. Them two unforfnit
speClators prowled about lookin' for me for some time,
an' about twelve o'clock at night they sailed in to do
the job without me. Well, you see, by then it was a
bit late for tial place. The people was up all night,
listcnin' for burglars everywhere, an' there was two
poUcemen there on watch as well. So Ginger Bates
and Joe Kelly was collared holus-bolus, an' thereby pre-
vented raisin' unproper claims to stand in with what I'd
scraped up myself. An' now they've bin wearin' knicker-
bockers theirselves for more'n two years, an' as soon as
they've done their time — well, there's no knowin' but
what they may make it a matter o' perfessionaj jealousy.
What ho-o-o-o!"

D,mi,.=db, Google

HIS TALE OF BRICKS.

"My luck again!" growled Snorkey Timms, elbowing
out from the unclean crowd about the faro-lab!e. The
imperturbable Hebrew in the bowler hat who sat banker
raked in Snorkey's shilling with a pile of others, and
paid an infinitesimal selection into the half-dozen eager
paws thrust in to receive.

"How much is that?" I asked.

"Thirteen bob altogether," Snorkey answered rue-
fully; "my very last blooming oat"

"Well," I remarked, "you didn't come here to gamble,
you know."

"In fact, Snorkey, having the entry to this particular
Whitechapel faro-hole, had come merely to bring me.
He was reminded, and across his eyes there fell that
odd, blank, half-sulky look, with something honestly
shame-faced about it, which I knew heralded an effort
to "tap" me.

"No," he grumbled, "it was to show you in; an' it's
cost me thirteen bob — me bringin' you 'ere."

"It needn't have done," I said; "but I'm game to
square it for you — when we're outside."

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

HIS TAt£ OF BUCKS. 75

Snorkey looked up quickly. "Don't keep it till
then," he said; "go an' pop it down for me. You'll
change the iuck."

"Why?"

"You ain't ever played faro, 'ave ye?"

"Never."

"Then you're bound to win. Ain't you ever noticed
it, teachin' a bloke a game o' cards! 'E always wins off
you. You go an' pop it down, like a pal."

"Snorkey," I said, "after each shilling you put down
and lost you called yourself several sorts of fool, and I
never heard you tell such a lot of truth all at once be-
fore. You sha'n't say those things about mc. Come to
the bar and explain why you think I can guess the
name of the next card better than you."

The bar was made of two packing-cases with an
old tablecloth nailed over them, and the sole bar-fitting
was a cheap Shoreditch-made overmantel, which pro-
vided shelves for a few whisky bottles. When you keep
an unlicensed bar that the police may raid at any mo-
ment it is foolish to have more than a night's supply of
liquor on the spot at one time. Snorkey turned from
the crowd of arched backs and plunging arms that shut
in the faro-table and we sat alone by the bar, drinking
a far better whisky than one would expect to find in
such a place, and contemplating so much of the world
as we could see.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

76

"Taint a thing as you can ai^e out," Snorkey ob-
served presently, "about a beginner winnin'. But you
must 'a' noticed it Though I must say it aint the same
in every game — games as isn't cards. I've found that
out, myself."

"What games, for instance?"

"Well, all sorts. Fou know."

I judged that Snorkey was thinking of the unlawful
games whereby, for the most part, he made his living.
It struck me, indeed, as a manifest thing that the prac-
tised burglar, for instance, must hold a great advant^e
over the novice, and I said something to that effect

"Ah," assented Snorkey, "an' that stands to reason.
'Tain't bustin' an' screwin' only, either, though that's
what you'd think of fust, natural enough. It's wonder-
ful 'ow awk'ard a thing comes as you ain't used to — any
simple thing. Peter-claimin', for one"

Indeed, the particular form of enterprise to which
Snorkey alluded would seem to off» no great technical
difficulty, consisting, as it did and does, merely of the
casual removal of unwatched bags and parcels from
railway-stations and such places.

I replied with raillery. "Surely Ihat isn't a novelty
for you?" I said.

"Praps, an' p'raps not," he answered placidly.
"But the fiist shot I made didnt rome off very gay. It
was on the strength o" that dossy knickerbocker suit I

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

HIS TALE OP BRICKS. 77

tried the game. You remember the knickerbocker
suit? "

I remembered it well. "Go on," I said, "I know all
about the suit Tell me about the peter-claiming."

Snorkey blew through his empty pipe, and I handed
over my pouch. Then, his pipe filled and well alight,
he began his stoty, to the accompaniment of the half-
suppressed but unceasing clamour from the table across
the room.

"Well, you see," he said, "I 'adnt bin dcrin' very
well up to the time o' that little touch down in the
country-^— come to that I don't seem ever to do very
well, some'ow. But that little job put me to rights for
a bit, an' what with the quids an' the dossy suit I was
a dook for a month or two, I tell you.

"Up to then I'd been doin' pretty near whatever I
could, mostly standin' in with others an' doin' the dirty
work for a predous small comer o' the stuff. So now
I thought 'ere was a good chance to go in on my own
OQ the strength o' the new clobber, as soon as the
plunder was melted. The clobber was a knickerbocker
country suit — but I said that before, o* course — an'
when I come to think over what line it 'ud do best for,
I could see plain enough it was peter-claimin'. A toff
in a dossy walkin' suit is right eao\^h at the main rail-
way-stations, but wouldn't look quite on the job anywhere
else — not in London, I mean. An' the more luggage you

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

78 DIVERS VANnXES.

can lay 'old of, why the more you look the part, you see.
So I made up my mind to peter-claimin'. It always
seemed a nice light branch, pretty easy an' safe, the way
things is done at the railway-stations, an' I'd 'a' gone in
at it before if it wasn't for wantin' the clothes. Now I'd
got 'em, an' I thought all the rest was easy as — as
drinkin' another whisky."

The illustration was facihtated by a second applica-
tion at the bar, and Snorkey proceeded.

"Well, I just pratted round to Ikey Cohen — you know
Ikey Cohen, don't you? It's 'im as runs this 'ere show."

"Oh," Isaid, "then it's not the one they call the boss?"

'"Im?" Snorkey answered, nodding toward a man in
shirtsleeves who was in direction of the establishment
"Lord, no — not 'im. 'E's the fancy proprietor put in to
do 'is three months if the place is raided, at thirty bob
a week for 'is missis while 'e's in, an' fifty quid for 'isself
when 'e comes out. Wish I'd got 'is job at 'alf the
money. No, it's Ikey Cohen as runs this an' others like
it You know 'is place up in 'Oxton— I showed it to
ye myself."

I knew the place, indeed: a shop of old clothes,
boots, bags, saddlery, cutlery — everything that is bought
cheap in lots. But the largest trade was transacted by
a detached ««//ot"<^ up a side-court, and it was the buying
of anything anybody might bring, at receiver's prices; for
Ikey Cohen was the biggest fence in those parts.

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc '

HIS TALE OF BRICKS. 79

"I went round to Ikey Cohen," Snorkey proceeded,
"an' I borrowed a swag— a bag, you know. Ikey's al-
ways game to lend you a bag, if you leave a bit on it
and sell 'im whatever stuff you touch for, afterwards.
There's some'U tell you about wonderful-made conjurin'
bags with no bottoms to 'em, which a peter-huater takes
to the station an' jist drops casual over a bag a bit
smaller, an' then lifts up the two, one inside the other,
and walks off. That's all rats. Sich things might 'a'
bin made — I aint sayin' they ain't bin, though I never
sec 'em — but they ain't the practical thing, an' machinery
for these jobs is all my eye. No; all you want's a sound
leather bag — a kit-bag or a portmanter or what not —
not too new; with a few bricks in it — locked. Then you
pop it down amoi^ a 'eap o' luggage an' pick up an-
other by mistake. If anybody spots you you apologise,
an' get your own again an' 'ave another try; if they don'l,
off you go with whatever luck you've picked up; easy
enough— when you're used to it

"Well, I got a good bag from Ikey — left 'alf a quid
on it. It was jist one of a job lot, shop-soiled, an' I
would 'a' liked it a bit dirtier for a fust try, but it was
pretty right, an' the others was much the same. So I
pratted off an' whacked a dozen or fifteen bricks into it,
locked it carefiil an' put the key in my pocket You
must always lock it — it might fly open in a crowd, an'
bricks looks bad in a portmanter; besides, when you do

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

80 DIV

the change it keeps the other bloke a bit longer before
he tumbles to the game an' sings out — 'e may think 'e's
makia' a bit on the swop!

"Well, I takes my bag o' bricks, an' jumps on a 'bus
in the Kingsland Road, an' gets off at the comer o'
Liverpool Street I thought I'd try Liverpool Street fust
because it struck me the stairs might make it a bit
easier. You can nip up the stairs from the main-line
platform, you see, an' get along Uie bridge to the other
side by Bishopsgate, an' watdi all the nay if anybody's
after you. So I got off at Liverpool Street and walked
down into the station.

"It may seem a bit tricky gettin' into a 'ouse at
night, but I can tell you it's pretty nervous gettin' to
work in a railway-station in broad day, if you ain't used
to it There's such a swarm o' people all over the shop,
each with a 'ed on 'is shoulders an' two eyes in it, that
you never know whether you're bein' piped or not, or
who's doin' it I walked about a bit in my nobby suit
an' thick stockin's, with my bag o' bricks all so dossy,
an' choked off 'alf a dozen porters as wanted to 'elp
me; an' at last I see my chance. What ho!

"I see sich a chance as I never expected — a chance
as you wouldn't see once in a 'undred times. For I
come round from the main platform to the suburban,
where there was a pretty good pile o' luggage stuck down
opposyte the indicator- board; an' there, just at one side

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

HIS TALE OF BRICKS. 8 1

o' the pile, was a bag the very spit o' the one I was
canyin'. A yeller leather bag with brass fittin's, just the
same make an' size, an' just about as new as mine. So
I whacked my bag down alongside of it and strolled off
a few yards, casual.

"I 'adn't quite got practice yet, you see, to put one
down an' grab the other all in a rush, 'cause that was a
sort o' thing more easy to be spotted, an' 1 was feelin'
more nervous than I ought, considerin'. So I jist turned
about casual for a few yards, an' as I come back I ups
with the bag I'd 'ad my eye on, more casual than ever,
lookin' careless the other way, an' 'ooked it off up the
nearest flight o' stairs.

"I turned off along the big twisty foot-bridge toward
the Bishopsgate part o' the station, an' I could see it
was all serene be'ind me, down below. There was the
other bag, an' nobody fussin' about it; so I began to
feel quite comfortable. I come right out into the side
bookin'-oflice all fair an' easy, an' it was all so very
serene I thought I'd 'ave a peep at what I'd got,
'specially as there seemed nobody about in the bookin'-
oflice, an' I couldn't think of any better place. I tried
the bag in a quiet comer, an' it was locked. But the
bag was so particular like mine I popped the key into
the lock, an' sure enough it turned it

"Well, when I piped what was inside that bag I
was never so much ker-flummoxed in all my nach'ral

t„Coo<ilc _^

82 DIVERS VANITl&S.

puffi For, s'elp me never, it was brides! Bricks, by
the 'oly poker!

"I stood an' stared an' blinked, an' then it come to
me sudden what a particular large fool I'd bin. I takes
another good 'ard look at the bag, an' the more I looked
at it the more I bloomin' well recognised it, an' the
more partik'tar extry lai^e-size foo! I felt, for it struck
mc clear as mud I'd bin and pinched ray own bag!
You see I 'adn't 'ad it more 'n 'aJf an hour, so it was
pretty easy to make mistakes.

" 'This is what comes o" bein' so flustered over a
new job,' I says to myself, 'an' lookin' the other way
when I picked up the bag; but p'raps it ain't too late
to put it right now,' I says. So I snaps the lock an'
turns the key, an' hoofs it back double-quick over the
long footbridge again. I took a liker over the railin*
when I turned the comer, an' there 1 pipes the bag still
all serene in the same place. So I went down the
dancers double-quick, an' down I slaps my bag again
alongside the other, an' swings out for another casual
turn around.

"Things seemed right enough, an' nobody watchin',
so I edged up careless once more an' grabbed the other
bag— though I'm blessed if I could 'elp lookin' the
other way when I did it 'Abits of innocence, I s'pose.
Any'ow I made sure I'd got the right 'un iJiis time, an'
I swaggered up the dancers an' along the bridge like a

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

HIS TALE OF BKICK5. 83

bloomin' dook on 'is own estate. It was all serene agaia
be'ind an' in front, but this time there was more people
in the bookin'-office, so I went through an' out across
the street an' into the private bar of a pub opposyte.
There was nobody else there, so I ordered a drink an'
then took a peep at my luck. This bag was locked
too, but the key fitted — most all them keys fit all round
— an' I took my peep.

"I took my peep an' I very near fainted on the
spot I did! S'elp me never, I nearly faintedl For it
was bricks again 1 Bricks again, s'elp me bob!

"I felt I must be goin' balmy on the crumpet I
swallered my first drink an* 'ad a brandy, an' I wanted
it Then I 'ad another good look at the bag. Surely
I 'adn't gone an' pinched my own again? I could 'a'
swore — I could 'a' bet, in fact — that I shoved mine
down on the right o* the other one, an' took this up
from the left I couldn't 'a' bin such a fool as to make
the mistake twice, I thought An' yet — an' yet— yet,
damn it all, the more I looked at this 'ere bag, the
more I seemed to remember it I took it up on my
knees an' turned it over, an' the more I turned it over
the more cerUin I felt that this was the bag I brought
from Ikey Cohen's. At last I turned up the bottom, an'
then I was sure, for there was a brass stud missin'.
You know the brass studs they 'ave, at the comers, to
take the wear? Well, one was gone, an' I remembered,

t„Coo<ilc —

84 DIVERS VANITIES.

now, that when Ikey pulled the bag down from the shelf
over 'is 'ead, one o' the studs wasn't there. It was
plain enough I 'ad pinched my own bag now, any'ow.
But what about the other? Surely I couldn't 'a' pinched
the same bag twice? But then, what 'ud just such
another bag 0' bricks be doin' there?

"I felt like chuckin' up the 'ole thing an' goin' 'ome.
But nobody likes bein' done, an' I wanted to see what
it all meant The thing sort of attracted me, if you under-
stand, an' I think, some'ow, I couldn't 'a' kep' myself from
goin' back to the station, an' lookin' for that other bag.

"So I locked up the bricks once more, an' went
across. But the other bag was gone clean now, ^1'
there I stood where I began, after doin' two sep'rate
dicks, with the same old bag o' bricks in my duke, an'
two drinks be'ind on the transaction.

"What it all meant I couldn't guess, but I was be-
ginnin' to get into practice by this, so I thought I'd see
it through, an' try again. I give the suburban depart-
ment a rest this time, for I piped a train comin' in on
the main Une, an' I could see a 'ole scuff o' people
collectin' in the main-Une bookin'-otlice, as though one
was soon agoin' out So I dotted round that way, an'
saw there was a good deal o' luggage spread about on
the floor, an' down beside it I whacks my old bag, not far
from the entrance, an' strolled off to see what might 'appen.

"Well, I scarcely done it when there came the most

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

HIS TALE OF BRICKS. 85

surprisin' bit o" luck. The click jist did itself. A most
astonishin' toff with a eye-glass — forty times as big a
dook as me, an' I was dossy, as you know — this most
rabunculous toff comes nishin' in from the platform,
whacks down a bag alongside mine, an', calls a porter.

"'Portah!' says the toff, 'call me a cab an' put that
bag on it;' an' 'e points with 'is stick.

"It seemed to me 'e pointed a bit careless, for the
porter grabs my bag an' slings out with it to the cab,
leavin' the toff's bag where 'e dropped it What ho!

"I didn't waste no time — no good 'angin' back over
a bit o' luck like that I whacks my duke onto the
toff's bag an' offs it into the station an' up the stairs
again. There was no bloomin' error now, for this bag
was twice as old as mine, an' 'ad straps round it. I
was on the job this time, an' no mistake; an' safe
enough, too, thinks I, 'cos even if the toff was standin'
before me at that moment, 'e couldn't deny it was 'im
as pointed the porter to the wrong bag. What was
more, I was pretty sure it 'ud be a good click, judgin'
from the style of the toff with the eye-glass. So I legs
it out over the footbridge pretty sharp in case the toff
^ould spot the mistake gettin' into the cab, an' at the
Bishopsgate door I skipped into a shoful myself — a
'ansom, you know — and told the bloke to drive ahead
up Shoreditch way; I guessed the toff wouldn't be goin'
thai way, any'ow,

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

86 DIVERS VAHITIES.

"Well, I put the bag across my knee in the cab, an'
took a look at the lock. It seemed a different sort o'
one from the other, but it was a bit loose, an' presently
I saw it was broke. So I unbuckled the straps very
eager an' pulled the peter open.

"Praps you won't believe what I'm goin' to tell you.
I shouldn't blame you, for at first I didn't believe it
myself — not when I see it with my own eyes I didn'L
I nibbed ray knuckles into 'em an' stared up at the sky
an' the 'ouses, to raake sure my litUe peepers was
workin', I looked at myself in the little bit o' lookin'-
glass by the door, to make sure it really was me, as
wide awake as usual. It tvas me, an' my eyes was
open; an' there on my knees was the toff's bag, an' —
strike me pink I — full o' bricks I

"Full o' bricks, I tell you, if I never speak another
word!

"It was so much like ghosts it give me the jumps.
Was I bein' 'aunted by livin' bricks, or was I goin' dean
off my rocker? It wasn't my eyes wrong, any'ow, for
1 could feel the bricks, as well as see 'em. There
couldn't be a bricklayin' competition anywhere down the
line, could there, that everybody was goin' to, with their
own bricks?

"Anywhere in the next two hundred yards you might
'a' smashed that bloomin' cab, an' I shouldn't 'a' noticed
it What pulled me round at last was seein' Triggy

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

mS TALE OP BRICKS. 87

Norton, stumpin' along in front on 'is little bandy legs,
canyin' my bag— the one I'd got from Ikey Cohen's!
Leastways an hour ago I'd 'a' swore to it, but now I
didn't feel like bein' sure of anything except that it
couldn't be anybody but Triggy with sich legs as them.
So I stopped the cab when it caught 'im up, an' got
out; but before I could say a word, 'Ullol' says Triggy,
'you've got my bag]'

" 'An' you've got mine!' says L

"'Well, it ain't any catch,' says Triggy, 'it's full o'
bricks I'

"'Same to you,' says I; 'so's yours — if it is yours.
But I got it off a toff with a eye-glass.'

"You see I could understand Triggy 'avin' a bag
full o' bricks, though 'e wasn't a peter-hunter. His game
was macia' the digs — takin' lodgin's on the strength of
'is luggage an' slidin' off with anything 'c might find.
So that a bag stuffed with bricks was just what 'e 'd
'ave, natural enough. But that didn't 'elp me. The toff
that brought this bag an' rushed off with mine was no
more like Triggy than your grandmother. Things was
wilder than ever.

" 'I don't know anything about a toff,' says Triggy,
'but I whacked that there bag down in Liverpool Street
Station while I got a drink, an' when I come back it
was gone an' this 'ere one left instead. I didn't mind
much, bein' as I thought at first I was makin' sorae-

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

88 DIVERS VANITIES,

thing on the deal; any'ow this is a better bag, if it m
fuU o* bricks.'

" 'Well I want it for Ikey Cohen,' says L An' then
I looks up the street an' sees something. 'Lumme!' I
says, "ere comes the toff with the eye-glass!'

"An' so 'e was — an' blow me silly if he 'adn't got my
bag, too! An' lookin' black as thunder with it an' all!

"'Why that's Jerry Wide, the peter-hunter!' says
Triggy. 'Don't you know Jerry? Hi Jerry! where are
you off to? '

"The toff Jerry looks 'ard at me. 'Who's this?'
he says.

"'Oh, it's all right,' says Triggy, 'only one o' the
mob. I thought you knew Snorkey. What luck?'

"'Luck?' says Jerry Wide; 'What luck? Why every
dam' bag in Liverpool Street Station's full o' bricks,
that's what luck! I never 'ad such a day in my life!
'UUo,' says he, pipin' the bag I'd got, 'why fhat't one
of 'em I'

"'Yes,' says Triggy, 'so's this!'

"'An' 'ere's another!' says Jeny Wide, puUin' up
the one in 'is 'and. An' so we three stood a-starin' at
each other.

" 'Look 'ere,' says Jerry presently, 'we'll 'ave a drink
on this, an' talk it over.'

"So we did, an' then it got plainer. Jerry Wide
got % bag from Ikey Cohen's too, out o' the same job

ii,mi,.=flt„Cooylc

HIS TALE OF BRICKS. 89

lot as mine. He hikes it off to Liverpool Street an'
there sees Triggy Norton's bag with nobody iookin' after
it, so 'e works the change and guys off. Then up I
comes an' does my httle turn — twice over, Uke as I told
you, with Ikey Cohen's two twin bags. An' Triggy, 'e
comes out an' finds another bag where 'e left 'is, and
toodles off with that. By this time Jerry Wide breaks
open Triggy's bag an' finds it full o' bricks, so back 'e
comes to ring another change. '£ looks out an' sees me
put down my bag in the bookin' office an' — what ho! —
'e's (Ml it at once, doin' it so neat an' artistic with the
porter an' all that I never dreamed it wasn't a mistake.
His cab was ahead o' mine when he found what he'd
got, an' he met us as he was comin' back, mighty wild.
An' so at last there we sat, the three of us in the pub
over our bags o' bricks, an' swore between the drinks."

" From all of which it seems to me," I said, seeking
to improve the occasion, "that faro and peter-htlnting
don't pay you."

"Never mind," replied Snorkey the incorrigible, "I've
'ad my bit o' fun out o' both."

In which remark I believe Snorkey told the secret
of his choice — if it were a choice — of his profession : if
you call it that

D,mi,.=flb,Gooiilc

TEACHER AND TAUGHT.

Skibbv Legg tramped the darkening streets with a
new hope in his little soul. It was a mean hope enough,
as beseemed its source, for it was no more than the
hope of safe employment as jackal of a bolder thief.
He was going on a mission from one high mobsman to
another, and in charge of stolen bank-notes.

Even such an employment had its drawbacks, it was
true: something of risk, though small, something of un-
certainty as to profit— though none that the profit would
be small also. But the drawbacks were less than Skibb^r
Legg could plainly see in any other mode of Hfe pos-
sible for him. Theft, bold and large, called for skill
and nerve, of which he had neither; and its risks were
great Theft small and feeble — common sneakery —
whereby he had sought to live, brought too little for the
needs of a family, and still was often punished. While
work was punishment itself, sure and certain. Withal
he wished to feed his wife and children, for whom his
natural affectioQ was second only to that he bore himself.

He had taken his orders that evening at a "bouse
of call" in the northern confines of the Jaga There he

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

TEACHER AND TAUGHT. QI

had met, by appointment, one Fish, high-mobsman,
welsher and broadsman, and was given his job. He was
to carry the notes — eight of ten pounds each — to an-
other high-mobsman, Flash Povey, at his lodgings at
Dalston, and offer him the lot for iifly pounds. This
was below the market price, for, in fact, any high mobs-
man could get nine pounds each for tenners got "on
the cross"; but Skibby Legg was to explain that Fish
wanted the money that evening, and was in debt to the
only fence immediately available. Consequently, if Povey
had the money in hand, or could get it, he might make
a handsome profit out of the transaction.

Legg's way lay across the Hackney Road and up
Great Cambridge Street; and the streets were quieter
and duller as he went, following the lamplighter along
the wide Queen's Road. Nine out of ten from the place
he had left, given such a charge as his, would have for-
gotten the message long ere this, because of the more
immediate interest excited by the effort to sell the notes
on their own account Skibby made this reflection with
some internal pride in Fish's reliance on his integrity.
But in truth he would never have dared to "mace" the
high-mobsman; and it was because Fish knew this that
he had picked him for the job. Still, self-esteem is a
luxury within the reach of the poorest in spirit, and
Skibby Legg, who would gladly have stolen the money,
but feared to do it, was as ready as any better-taught

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

92 DIVl

man to set his cowardice against his knavery and call
the product a virtue.

As he went he fell a-wondering as to the man with
whom he was to do business. The name of Flash Povey
he knew well enough, but the man himself was a stranger.
He was spoken of vaguely as a distant star in the upper
ether of rascality, wholly out of sight from the nether
slough wherein waded Skibby Legg and his like. Whis-
pers of his exploits came down the intervening mists,
and it was said that such was his acuteness that he had
never once suffered a conviction. Skibby wondered what
sort of man he should meet, what manner of quarters
he maintained, and what he offered his visitors to drink.
If his reception seemed to warrant it, Skibby resolved
to hint at a small commission on the bargain he was
bringing, and so perchance draw a dividend at both ends.

He stood before the house at last — a most respect-
able house, stuccoed and semi-detached, with garden
front and rear, in a short road of similar houses. A
man who had been leaning against the railings of the
house opposite, smoking a pipe, turned and strolled off
along the road as Skibby went in at the gate.

His knock was answered quickly, for a servant was
lighting the gas behind the door. Legg gave himself no
more identity than that he was "from Mr. Fish," and as
the girl took the words he was conscious of some pass-
ing presence of faded alpaca beyond the stairs, where

ii,mi,.=flt„Goo<ilc

93

the landlady made momentary observation. He saw no
more of her, however, for the servant, with a prudent
regard to his appearance, shut the door in Skibby's face
while she carried his message.

The door reopened in a very few seconds, and Mr.
Fish's deputy was shown his way up the stairs, darkening
as they rose. In the first-floor front room, hghted by
nothing but the dull fire in the grate and the last dusk
glimpse through the window, he sat to watt; and again
it was not for long.

For as he sat staring at the fire he started at a
sudden barking cough by his ear, and in the moment
was conscious of a light behind him. He turned and
encountered a face, set as it were in the light of a
candle that left the rest of the room in a gloom almost
as deep as ever. It was a dear-skinned, waxen face —
rather as if the wax were gone a little shiny in the heat
of the candle; and the hollow of each cheek had a red
spot like a dab of raddle. There was a set grin on this
face — an uncomfortable grin that might mean forced
affability or native malignity, and Skibby could not tell
which. And withal he somehow remembered the face
— had known it well, he felt sure, in its rounder and
healthier days.

"Good evening," said Skibby Legg; and then, "sir."
That stare through that grin made a man uncomfortable.

"Good evening, Skibby Legg."

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

94 DIVERS VANITIES.

Now he knew. He had been wondering, but the
voice — the voice pronouncing his name — brought much
to his memory, and he knew. Flash Povey had begun
life under another name, and Skibby Legg had started
him. As a boy he had be«i lob-crawler and parlour-
jumper for Skibby, who had waited by shop doors
while his junior crept on hands and knees toward tills,
and who had bunked him into open windows to bring
out anything he could find, and get whatever his prin-
cipal chose to give him for his trouble. It was a divi-
sion of labour — and profits — which suited Skibby's tem-
perament; and he had been sorry when misfortune — to
the boy — separated them. And now his pupil, a grown
man, had reached the top of the tree. It was wonder-
ful how some chaps got on.

"Why, Coopert — Ned Cooper!" exclaimed Legg.

The grin widened, and now Skibby saw it had no-
thing of affability in it at all.

"I think you'd better forget that name, Skibby Legg.
I dont want to hear it What have you come for?"

Of course, Skibby reflected, the gentleman would
not like his real name mentioned. He apologised, a
little awkwardly, and just as awkwardly brought out his
message from Ksh. For Povey had lit another candle,
and having put the two on the table by his side, now
sat with his sharp face thrust forward, his grin un-
abated, listening to the end without a sound, save now

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

TEACHER AND TAUGHT. 95

and again the hard little cough that sounded like a
je«-.

Le^ finished, and there was a short pause. Then
Povey, never moving his eyes, so hard and glassy, from
Legg's, put out his hand and said: "Give me the notes."

Skibby took the little bundle from his inner pocket,
opened it out, and put it into the outstretched band.
Then at last the uncomfortable eyes shifted, and Flash
Povey turned the eight notes over and examined them
one after another. This done, he took them up in a
sheaf, put a comer of it into the flame of the nearest
candle, dropped the blazing paper on the tire, and
thrust it well in with the poker.

"TTiere go your eight tenners, Mr. Skibby L^g,"
said Flash Povey.

The unhappy messenger clutched the chair under
him with both hands, and sweat broke out on his face.
"G — g— glor! They ain't minel" was all he could gasp.

"Yours or Fish's or the Mogul's, it's all the same
now," retorted Flash Povey, taking a large shiny revolver
froia his pocket and laying it on the table by his side.
"It's a clumsy plant, though I didn't expect much better
from that mob."

Skibby Legg sat bewildered, turning his eyes from
the glassy gaze of Flash Povey to the pisbd on the
table, and back again — -always back again to Povey's
eyes. What the man meant Legg could not guess.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

96 DIVERS Vanities,

The Mogul was a name he had heard as he had heard
Povey's — coming as an echo from above. The Mc^l
was not a gonoph — a thief — in the common sense, but
a speculator in theft; a designer of scoundrelism, a
backer of scoundrels, a financier of large fraud; the
head, or thereabouts, of the whole tracl,e, and as safe
from the police as any man in London. So much
Skibby knew, but the rest of Flash Povey's meaning
was beyond his guess. He stammered some words of
desperate protest, but Povey cut him short.

"You can't kid me like that," said the grinning
phthisic "1 expected something of the sort, but I
thought it 'ud be a trifle cleverer." He had the pistol
in his hand now, and Legg's distress was that he could
not watch that and the man's eyes at the same time.
"At any iMe you don't expect to kid me, do you?"

Skibby Lcgg managed to stutter that he didn't know
nothing about It, s'elp him.

"Know nothing? Pah! They were eight notes from
the Phcenix Hotel job, an' the woodenheadest rozzer in
London knows the numbers by heart I was to go oat
an' be pinched at the front gate with 'em on me, an'
get a lagging. It 'ud suit the Mogul to put me away
for a few years, an' there's been a nark of his piping
the house all day. Does he think I'm a baby? Eh?"
The red spoU on Povey's face stood now like blood-
gouts on a corpse, and his grin was ghastly. "But you

ii,mi,.=flt„Coo<ilc

TEACHER AND TAUGHT. 97

needn't bother about it — you're not going back to
him ! "

Skibby Le^s gaze left Pove/s eyes from that mo-
ment, and fixed instead on the little steel circle that
was thiust so dose before them that they seemed to
cross in a terrified squint. For some while now he saw
no eye but the foremost eye of the pistol, and the little
group of dimmer eyes that lurked behind that But
he heard Povey's voice, and the words seemed to come
beating on the crown of his head.

"No, Skibby L^g, you're not going back, I'm going
to die myself before very long, they say; but you're
going to die first That's what they counted on — I'd
get sentenced for the notes, and my light 'ud go out in
the jug. But I want the rest of my life out of stir, you
see. I'll have it so; and so wilt you, for you are going
to die in five minutes. Eh?"

The words beat on the crown of Skibb/s head, and
some sdid thing rose and swelled in his chest till it
stopped at his throat and began to choke him. Povey
went on.

"I meant to have had a talk to you before, but I've
been too busy. I might never have found the time — I
might never have found you — if you hadn't come to me
yourself, and brought me this other little bill to settle.
For there was one owing already — oh yes I You wouldn't
understand, perhaps. You look up to me, Skibby Legg

Divsn Vanilus. 7

u,Mz=<i„ Google

C)8 DIVERS VANITIES.

— you call me 'sir.' Envious of me, Skibby Legg?
Proud of your scholar? Outside they will tell you I
have never been convicted. You know a little better,
but it's very nearly true. I make yellow quids at the
game while you can't make brown ha'pennies. You put
me on to that game, and perhaps yoo iiunk I owe you
a turn for it! Yes, I do, and you shall have it, Skibby
Legg! You shall have it! You took me in hand — a
boy that might have been anything — and you showed
me an easier game than hard work. You showed me
the trick, and you took what it fetched, till tlte day I
was collared in that area, and then you txdted and left
me. 1 got my first conviction for that — ray only dose,
but it was enough. There was only one way for me
after that, and I took it, and here 1 am. Here I ano,
and you envy me; I have done so well that I ought to
be grateful, eh? Eh? If you had cut my throat you
would have got the rope round your neck; but you
taught me to dip the lob, and you won't understand
when I tell you how grateful I am. Grateful as the
hangman's rope, Skibby Legg! And now you come to
get me my second conviction, and I really can't let my
account run any longer. You'd have done better to
have cut my throat, Skibby Legg, when you might have
done it The hangman might not have got you, but
nothing can save you from me!"

Skibby Legg's mouth opened, but there came no

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

TEACHER AND TAUGHr. 99

sound but a diy choke. His hands lost their hold of
the chair frame beneath him, and wandered weakly in
space. The steel eye came nearer till he saw it no more,
but suddenly felt it, cold and small, on his forehead.

His hands wandered, and his mouth opened. In
intent he was pleading, begging his life, but he heard
no sound from his own lips.

"Cool against the forehead, isn't it? It won't last
long. A little sickish? A little sickish, Skibby Legg?
Of course: you're dying, you know. Usual to feel a
little sickish. It'll be all over presently — when I pull
the trigger. You're nearly through it — all but that; just
the crash. Only the crash, and it's over. You are dying
—dying— "

Skibby Legg rose three inches in his chair and fell
back, with a faint pule in his throat His senses shrank
to one, through which nothing reached him but a roar-
ing as of a great sea. . . . And then

Flash Povey coughed, and put the pistol back on
the table; and presently Legg could see him again, his
wolfish grin persisting, his glassy eyes unmoving in their
dark pits, his hands resting on his thin knees.

"Speaking of the crash reminded me," he said.
"The noise would be very inconvenient They would
come in and find your carcass — and find me. Wouldn't
do. Besides, my landlady is a very respectable woman
— -wholly unconnected with the trade you taught rde--- .
7' ■".■

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

lOO DIVERS VANITIES.

and it would be bad for her; bad for her carpet, too,
and the ceiling underneath. No — I sha'n't do it. You've
died already, as far as your feelings go; all but the
crash, as I said — the easiest part of it As for the
rest — I really believe it'll hurt you a deal more in the
long run to let you Uve. You've a deal to go through,
Skibby Legg, in your way of life, and you'll have to die
again at the end of it Yes — I'll think over the question
of letting you live a bit. Drink this — ifs brandy."

Flash Povey thrust the edge of the glass between
Legg's shaking jaws, and tilted it I^gg swallowed
greedily, and then sat, a limp heap, staring before him.
Presently he caught his breath sharply, and began to
sob. Then he dropped his face on his hands, and
burst into tears.

For a littie while Povey watched him, grinning and
coughing by turns. Then he rose and shook Legg by the
shoulder, "This won't do," he said. "Get up, and
come for a walk. Take some more brandy if you want it;
but pull yourself tc^ether till I turn you off the premises,"

Skibby Legg looked up and began: "S'elp me, sir,
I never "

But Povey cut him short "Drink the brandy, and
then shut your mouth," he said, "You've made all the
noise I want in my place already."

^Legg took the glass with a feeble hand, and emptied
,. ^ai a gulp, Povey took him by the aim.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

TEACHER AND TAUGHT. lOI

"Come," he said, "you're a stronger man than I am:
stand up and walk. I'm not going out by the front,
where your friends are waiting; there's another way."

They went down the stairs, out at the back, and
across the little garden to a door in the farther walL
This passed and dosed, they stood in a footway with
garden walls on each side,

'Tm just going to see you safe away from your
pals," Povey said quietly. "Don't forget I've got the
revolver with me; remember it if you're tempted to try
bolting, or shouting, or anything of that sort That way."

He pushed L^g before him to the end of the pas-
sage, and then walked by his side through a succession
of back streets. The brandy had revived Skibby Legg,
and the night air calmed his nerves. He began to
speak.

"I never wanted to nark you, sir," he protested.
"S'help me, I on'y come with the message from Fish! I
don't know nothin' about "

"You needn't talk," Povey interrupted. "Anything
you say's more likely to he a lie than not, even if it's
probable; and that isn't probable."

They went between posts set in a narrow passage,
and down a few steps to a canal towpath. This way
was often used in daylight by foot-passengers as a short
cut, but now it lay dark and empty.

"Skibby Legg," said Povey, "there's the water,

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

I02 DIVERS VANTTTES.

Wouldn't you rather end it all there? I should if I
were you."

Legg backed away quickly from the edge. "No,
sir," he whined, "no — dont begin on me again, sir!
S'elp me, I thought I was doin' you a turn — I did!"

The pistol was shining faintly in Povey's right hand,
and he took a hold of Legg's coat with the left. "Don't
try to break away or call out," he said softly, "or it'll
come quicker. I think I may as well finish now; it was
only for my own convenience that I put it off before."
The pistol crept toward Legg's face as Povey spoke.
"There's no reason why I shouldn't do it here now, and
I think 1 will."

The revolver tapped Legg's forehead twice, and
Povey's face was demoniac behind it. "Now, Skibby
Legg, Skibby Legg," he said, "what time shall I give
you? It's now, Skibby Legg, now!"

Legg pulled feebly, and pleaded, now, with a voice of
broken whispers. "Not now! Oh, not now! Not to-night!
I'll do anything! Let me go — let me go to my children!"

Povey withdrew his pistol a little way, and his grin
grew more thoughtful. "Children?" he said. "So
you've got children? I hope you're bringing them up
as you did me! You shall go to them — for to-night, at
any rate. Teach them to dip the lob! Go to them
to-night, and I'll watch you home. I'll not lose track
of you, Skibby Legg!" ■

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

TEACHER AND. TAUGHT.

Skibby Legg's wife was perplexed by an odd
change. Hitherto, whatever his failure in other respects,
her husband had eaten and slept as well as any man.
Now he woke at night in fits of crying, clutching at her
and pleading incoherently for his life; and he lay in a
tremble for an hour after each fit. At daytime he
skulked at home. She had known him do this before;
but he had never before failed to eat the most of what-
ever meal their doubtful resources might provide, and
now he scarce ate at all. He drank, however, when-
ever he could get the means or the invitation. Like
many weak men, he had been something of a tyrant at
home, and now he would make no clear explanation of
his trouble, and resented questions. She saw him once,
as she went about her search for charing, with a well-
dressed man, hectic, hollow-eyed, and coughing; and
when she mentioned the fact later, and asked questions,
he was first angry and then tearful, but he would tell
her nothing.

A little after this he "got into trouble," which meant
that he had six months' imprisonment (or a bungled
theft at a shop-door. And though the six months was
a sore time of struggle and privation for Mrs. Legg, she
was rewarded to see her husband emerge a sounder
man than he went in. He slept now, and could eat

t„Coo<ilc

I04 DIVERS VAHTTIES.

It was a little after his release that a friend proposed
to him a joint enterprise in blue pigeon flying. Blue
pigeon flying is no matter for the bird-fander, but con-
sists in the ripping out and carrying away of lead sheet-
ing and pipes from empty houses. Carefiilly done, it
is regarded as a safe branch of the game; and if two
work together, at a suitable place, they can make it
pay fairly well. In this case the place was a rat-riddled
warehouse on the borders of Homerton Marsh — a place
that would seem, at first glance, to have been stripped
long ago. But Bob Wickeus had looked farther, and
reported that there was not only blue pigeon in plenty,
but brass taps and gas-fittings. You might go to and
fro half a dozen times, he said, and do well at every
journey. He and Skibby Legg, as a matter of fact, only
went once, and what happened on that occasion Bob
Wickens confided to Snorkey Timms, afler an inquest at
which Bob had been a witness.

"O' course," said Bob, "I didn't say where I'd bin,
nor what I'd bin doin'. Tain't likely, even if they'd
wanted it But as a matter o' fact me an' Skibby 'ad
bin along to that old ware'us there by the toarsb, after
blue stuff. 'E was balmy — no doubt about that, an' I
shouldn't 'a' 'ad 'im in it if I'd rumbled it soon enough,
but I didn't He seemed all right, goin' along. But
'c'd just 'ad six months, and p'raps that upset 'im.
Anyway 'e was off 'is 'ead — that I 4o know. There

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TEACHER AND TAUGHT. IO5

was a wall with a gate in it, but I'd readied the gate
the flight afore, an' we was iaside in a jifF. It was
daytime, o' course — afternoon. It wouldn't 'a' done to
go about a place like that with a light at night-time —
you'd 'a' 'ad the whole parish a-starin'. We climbed
in at a winder — there was thick bare, but on'y
screwed in.

"Well, as soon as we was inade, Skibby gives a
jump. '"What's that noise?' says 'e.

"'Rats,' I says. 'The place is alive with 'em.' An'
so it was. When I first went to take a look at it I see
'em ^n' 'eard 'em everywhrare — they very nigh jumped
on me.

" 'Oh,' says Skibby, starin' dull an' rum in the eyes.
'Rats, is it? All right, if it's on'y rats.'

"So we legged it up the dancers, 'cos the stuff was
on the top floor an' the roof. Skibby was all jumpy,
an' the farther up we went the jumpier 'e got 'E
backed away sudden from every door, an' every now an'
then 'e turned round an' looked 'ard down the st^urs.

"'What's up with you?' I says.

" 'I don't like this place," says Skibby; 'it's full o' —
full o' rats; and noises,'

"It's a fact there -was noises, but it was what the
rats made; they was everywhere. But a rum thing I
did notice when we got near the top was that some o*
the rats began to foUer us. Not snappish, nor ^}4hing

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ro6 DIVERS VANITIES.

like that, you understand, but just trottin' up close be-
hind like tame 'uns — or more hke frightened 'uns, if
you understand. Like a little dawg as gets close behind
'is master when 'e sees a big dawg comin'. But Skibby,
'e never seemed to notice 'em, but kep' on starin' wide
all round 'im, like as if 'e was afraid o' someone pop-
pin' out at 'im.

"Well, there was a room atop o' the place where
there was a row o' taps an' a lot o' thick pipe an' a
trough agin the wall, lined with lead. It was the best
part o' Ihe job, an' good for a fust-rate sackful in twenty
minutes. So I outs with the chisels an' 'ammers to get
to work, but Skibby wouldn't touch 'em. 'E took no
notice o' me, but stuck with 'is back to the trough,
starin' at the door we come in by.

"'Ketch 'old,' 1 says. 'Are you drunk, or what?'
"But 'e on'y stood an' stared at the door; so I
wasted no more time. I began a-pullin' down the pipes
on my own. 'A fine cop bringin' you,' I says. 'I bet
you'll be on the job when it comes to takin' your whack,
anyhow,' I says. So I got on puUin' away the pipes.
An' then I see as the rats was gatherin' thick under the
trough — between us an' the wall, you see. Such a mm
start as that I never see in my life. They come sneakin'
along the corner o' the wall all round^it was a cement
floor — an' bunchin' up in a sort o' heap under the
trou^,- an' the rummiest thing was all of 'em was

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TEACHER AND TAUGHT. IO7

lookin' an' sniflin' one way — between our legs at the
door. I let go the pipe to look at 'em; an' then I
heard Skibby go down whack on the floor, makin' noises
like a chained-up dawg.

""Elp, Bobl' 'e calls out. "Elp! Don't let 'im do
it, Bob! Take it away from 'im, Bob!'

"I turned round, an' there 'e was on the floor, on
his knees an' one hand, fencin' away with the other
'and in front of 'im.

"'For God's sake have mercy!' 'e Sfud; a-talkin' to
the empty room between 'im an' the door. 'For God's
sake have mercy! I've died — I've died a dozen times
a'ready! Ain't it enough? Not now! Let me go! Let
me go to my children!'

"I took him by the arm an' spoke to him, but he
never turned his head; an' his face was worse than any
corpse's I ever see. An' s'elp me, I looked under the
trough, an' there was the rats all round the other way,
tails out, shovin' their noses down into the comer, an'
fightin' to get deeper in the crowd! I knelt down aside
of Skibby, an' shook him, an' he groaned, an' fell of a
heap — sort o' fainted.

'Td had enough for a bit, so I shoved the hammers
an' chisels in the sack an' rolled it up, an' I shook up
Skibby again, an' started to get him out of it He rolled
up pretty dull an' stupid with a bit more shaking, an' I
got him down the stairs. An' when we went out o' the

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to8 DIV&RS VANITiES.

room I see the rats saeakin' off both ways along the
corner of the wall an' round to the door.

"I dra^^ed 'im through the winder somehow, an*
out on the marsh. 'What's come to you, Skibby?' I
says. 'Are you bahny?'

"'Didn't you see 'im?' says he, hangin' onto me
tremblin'; 'didn't you see 'im?'

"'See who?' says I,

"'flash Povey,' says Skibby.

"'Flash Povey!' says L 'Why, he's been dead a
month!'

"An' so he had. He pegged out while Skibby was
doin' his six mouths, you remember."

"Um," said Snorkey Timms. "An' that's aJI?"

"That's all what I didn't tell the coroner," answered
Bob. "But I said 'e seemed very much off 'is rocker
while 'e was with me. An' when we got to the canal
he would go down along the towpath, though it wasn't
'is way 'ome.

"'Go along. Bob,' 'e says; 'you leave me alone.
I'll be better in a bit'

"I didn't quite know what to do, but I thought I'd
come along an' tell 'is missis 'e seemed a bit round-
my-'at An' so I did. An' they found 'im in the canal
the next morning."

D,mi,.=db,Gooiilc

HEADS AND TAILS.

D,mi,.=db, Google

D,mi,.=db, Google

A BLOT ON ST. BASIL.

In the parish of St Basil-in-the-East there is like
to be a vacanq' for a maJe Bible-reader, for com-
mittees are allare at the scandalous misuse of some
part of Mr. Albert Murch's last week's pay. It was not
extravagant pay for a week, being, in fact, some way
short of a sovere^n. But it was explained to him at
his appointment that the consciousness of doing good
should support him: not to mention his old mother.
And many people — on the committees, for instance —
worked zealously for no other reward whatever: as was
notorious everywhere; and if it were not notorious, truly
it was by no neglect of the committees.

Nor is this the first complaint against Mr. Murch,
though certainly it is the most shocking. He was a
promising young man in the beginning, becomingly
docile and obedient, and with some enthusiasm for his
work, as was shown by his renunciation of his situation
and prospects, in order to de^^te himself thereunto.
But as time went, and his clothes grew seedier, it be-
came vaguely suspected that he had b^un to hold
secret opinions of his own in the matters of visits and

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112 DIVERS VAMITI£S.

relief of the poor: an inellable presumption- For the
committees, and liie associations, and the rest, did they
not know all about it? They gave their whole energies
(for some hours a week) to the business, and their
names were known far and wide as Authorities on the
Lives of the Poor; while he, of whom nobody out of
the parish had ever heard, was little more than one of
the poor himself, groping about underground among
them. Now and again he had an imtating trick of
being right; and if he had been less insignificant, and
if the committees and associations had not needed most
of their jealousy and spite for use among themselves,
he would have run into trouble sooner.

It seemed plain that constant contact with the lower
orders had blunted all his liner feelings. He would
recommend the most sullen and unrepentant for reUef
— people so wholly conscious of their lack of claim
that they never asked for themselves; people altogether
unconverted; while others, fervidly converted a dozen
times over, and ever ready to be converted again, he
reported "undeserving." Fortunately there were those
who could check his discreditable partiaUdes; as in a
flagrant case, but a Uttle before his final lapse, when a
member of a committee, minded to make personal
visits in Randall's Rents, found two very respectful and
plainly deserving families wholly destitute of bedding,
coals, and provisions — a state of affairs that Mr. Murch

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A BLOT ON ST. BASIL. 1 1 3

had never even reported. The deficiencies were sup-
plied on the spot And the Bible-reader's explana-
tions, when he was called to account, were far-fetched
and ludicrous. He tried to convince the committee
that the two families, the Dodds and the Blandys, hav-
ing word of the nearing visitor, passed their portable
property through their windows, which stood frame to
frame in a wall-angle; first all the Dodd bedclothes into the
Blandys' room, and then, as soon as the visitor was
engaged on other floors, all the Blandy property, with
the Dodds' own, in the opposite direction, so that both
rooms should seem equally necessitous. To offer such
a story was a mere trifling with the committee, and
Mr. Murch was told so, with asperity. It was also an
insult to the intelligence of the exploring committee-
member, and an evidence of an unworthy attitude of
mind toward the suffering poor.

Mr. Murch, for his part, went his way hopelessly
enough. He was not a strong man, either in body or
in spirit; and such strength as he possessed grew from
fervour of conviction and knowledge of his work. Still,
he was ever at odds with himself, and the prey of
doubts. Was he right, afl^r all, in his treatment of the
Hanks, and should he have said what he did to the
Foysers or not? Such questions kept him awake at
night. Again, should he have given the man Bri^s
those few coppers from his own pocket (for the com-

DiVm VaiHiit. 8

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J 14 DIVERS VANITIES.

mittee would give nothing), when his mother was dd
and ailing, and really needed beef-tea? Which way lay
his duty?

His offence, which surprised even the Randall's
Renters, and for that was noised abroad, was conunitted
on a dank, wet day, when the world bore a more than
commonly hopeless aspect in his eyes. His umbrella
had grown so bad of late, had gone at so many joints,
that he left it at home. He buttoned his coat about
him — though he was loth to put strain on the worn
button-holes — turned down his hat-biim, and dodged
the puddles as best he might

Randall's Rents was to be the scene of his morn-
ing's work, and thither he took his way, through streets
growing narrower and fouler as he went Mrs. Ban-
nam's was the case he had most in mind, and he
doubted much if he should find her alive. A long
course of drinking, and insufficient eadng with it, had
laid her low with a hopeless hobnailed liver, and now
hyperstatic pneumonia had come in to cut the stni^le
shorter. As a hard drinker she was no rarity in Ran-
dall's Rents, but she had been also a hard worker,
which was in no way so common. She had sworn at a
lady visitor, who had pushed into her room without
knocking or asking leave, and so was cut off from the
aid of committees; and she had loudly proclaimed that
she could work for her own blankets, coals, and groceries,

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A BLOT ON ST. BASIL. 1 1 5

and would neither beg, nor go to church, nor be con-
verted, in order to get them free. She had been the
chief support of a very large son of about thirty, who
cherished his constitution by leaning against the door-
post of the Three Bells, and felt unfitted for personal
exertion except when supplies ran short, and it became
imperatively necessary to punch his mother. So that
her now destitute child had taken himself off, and neigh-
bours tended her.

As Mr. Murch, already half wet through, turned the
comer into Randall's Rents, harsh yells met his ears,
and an occasional shout, as of encouragement The
yells were the yells of Mrs. Blandy, who danced about
the gutter, and screamed defiance at the Dodds, one
and all. For the Dodds had turned out unsportsman-
like in r^ard to the spoil of the committee- member,
and this was the third day of the consequent row.
The fortune of sport had so laid it that the Dodds had
received the larger dole, and while the Blandys very
properly held that the whole bag, as product of their
joint operations, should be put to fair division, the
Dodds held fast to all they had got, and kept in the
family all the liquor it produced.

"Call yerself a man!" shrieked Mrs. Blandy, who

was menacing each member of the opposing family in

turn, and now came to its head. "Call yerself a man

Why, look there I TTiere goes the bloomin' Bible-reader.

8*

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It6 DIVERS VANITIES.

Blimy if 't ain't a better man than you! 'E don't 'ide
away from a wranan, any*ow! An' you're a— — "

Mr. Murch hurried oo, and ento^ an open door.
Mis. Bannam's room was on the second floor, but he
stopped at a door just within the passage to ask for
news. He knocked, but got do answer. Then again,
and called, "Mrs. Tapoer!" Whereat came a sound
from within, between a grunt and a wail, and Murch
pushed open the door.

Mrs, Tapner was very fat, very dirty, very much
unhooked about the bodice, greatly bedraggled about
the hair, and not at all sober. She sat on a stool, and
her head lay back against the wall

"Giddy young kipper!" she glutted, with a leer.
"Giddy young kipper, comin' into a lady's room when
she's drunk! 'Ave a lil drop yeself!" And she pointed
to a small flat bottle on the floor beside her.

It was a safe offer, for everybody knew Mr. Murch
for a teetotaler. "I came to ask about Mrs. Bannam,"
he said, "before I go up. I suppose you've not been
up there this morning?"

"Mish' Bannam's wuss off'n me," the woman an-
swered, with a hiccup and a giggle. "I'm in 'eaven;
presen'ly she'll be in 'ell, with no 'eaven fust, like what
I've got Doctor's up there now."

Murch thought he would wait, and see the doctor

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A BLOT ON ST. BASIL. 1 1 ?

as he came out He turned slowly toward the door,
and the woman behind him chuckled again.

"What's good o' you?" she said. "You bring pore
people 'ell out o' the Bible; others brings us 'eaven — in
a quartern bottle."

"If you was sober you'd be ashamed to know you
said such things," said Mr. Murch. "There's no 'eaven
in the gin-bottle, but bitter repentance. Anyone that
brings you that's no friend."

"Ain't they? Not when they brings it in a ticket,
or a pair o' boots, or a petticut? Oh, there's waysl
Fiou know."

Truly he knew, and knew the regular tariff in gin
for charity-given shirts and boots and groceries. But
the doctor's step was on the stairs.

"Ah!" SEud the doctor on the landing; "I won't be
back agfun unless I'm called, and I know I sha'n't be.
Two or three hours is about her time — more or less.
I suppose you must say something, but I wouldn't
wony her."

The air of the room was faint and fetid. A rag of
old skirt half obscured the grimy window, against which
a bare-armed slattern pressed her face, to catch what
view she might of the row outside Dodd's. She turned
her head at Murch's entrance, but, seemg it was he,
she addressed her eyes again to the window.

The bed was a low one, indefinite as to shape and

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1 18 DIVEBS VANITIES.

supports, and covered with the dying woman's skirts
and under-clothes, supplementary to the insufficient bed-
linen. A chair had been planted at the uppor end,
supported in which she half sat, half lay. Her face was
gross and putfy, slaty in hue, and blue about the mouth,
and she breathed lightly and quickly, eyes fixed on the
wall before her: for to take breath was now conscious
and incessant work. Murch stepped quietly across the
floor, and knelt beside her.

"Don't — read," she said presently, with a breath
between the words.

He had not intended to read, for he remembered
the doctor's caution. Without, the row waxed amain,
and it was plain that one Dodd, at least, had sallied
from the stronghold. Feet pattered on the pavement,
and boys yelled dehght At the window the woman
jammed her eye closer, for the fray was drifting up the
street

Murch bent his head for a few seconds. When he
looked up the dying woman was regarding him — a litde
curiously, he thought

"I'm — goin' — 'ard — crool 'ard," she gasped.

He offered comforting words — though he had said
them so often in such cases that they had become a
formula, and he felt them a mockery. The row in the
street quieted suddenly, and then revived in a new key-
No doubt a policeman had come.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

"Can I do anything to make you comfortable?"
Muich asked, softly.

"Ever — know — me — beg? "

"Never once."

Again her eyes were turned on him with an odd,
questioning look. "Then — gimme — sixpence — now,"
she said.

He wondered, "What is it you want?" he asked.

She made as though to shake her head. "No —
gimme — the — axpence."

Too well he knew what any bye-chance sixpence
went to buy in Randall's Rents. "But," he murmured,
"I— I'm afraid you'd buy gin with it"

At the words the slaty mask ht up, and the eyes
turned skyward. "Wouldn't — I — just!" said Mrs. Ban-
nam.

He stood, conscious of a strange shock. Well indeed
his creed taught him — the hard creed he learned at his
mother's knees — the fate of that lost soul in two hours'
time. And the words were fresh in his ears — the words
of the obscene creature leering and rolling below: "No
'eaven fiist, like what I've got!"

He turned toward the door, his hand to his head.
Then he looked, as for help, to the slattern at the
window; but though she may have heard, she looked
without, where two pohcemen were hauling off her neigh-
bours. His gaze fell last on the bed, and there was a

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I20 DIVERS VANITIES.

blue, appealing face that looked as it were already from
another world.

Two pennies and a ^xpence was all left of last
week's pay. He scarce knew his hand had gone to his
pocket ere the sixpence was lying on the bed, and he
was stumbling blindly on the stairs.

D,mi,.=db,Gooiilc

ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE.

Bill Harnell, lighterman, red and hairy, clumped
home late up Old Gravel Lane. For such bad times
as these on the river, Bill had had a lucky spell, and he
bore its trophies with him. A new pair of water-boots
is a thing of consideration, a matter of thirty-five shil-
lings; a piece of trade gear renewed on momentous days,
jrears apart, when the fates are propitious and savings
adequate; days remembered with birthdays and wedding-
days. This had been such a day; more, it was a day
of general rig-out, and Bill Hameli's blue serge coat,
thick as a board, was new and stiff &om the slop-shop,
as also was his cap. Where light fell from a shop
window a bulging pocket was observable in the new
coat, with an exposed wrap of paper and a fishtail —
signs of supper provided for. And so Bill Hamell,
rolling at the shoulders, stiff and heavy below the knees,
clumped h(»ne that evening up Old Gravel Lane, re-
flective.

Truly he was a fortunate man, and not as so many
in the swamp of humanity about him. There were
some whom the price of his water-boots would keep in

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122 DIVERS VANITIES.

better raiment than their own for two years and more,
and to whom his serge coat, when rotten and thread-
bare with time, would be a prize to risk gaol or life for;
many who at that moment might be debating whether
or not more of life were worth the waiting — for want of
an unconsidered morsel of that supper that bulged his
coat-pocket

Bill Harnell might have been clairvoyant Two
hundred yards ahead, where the great dock-wall turned
its vast flank into the lane, a bridge spanned a dark
channel. It was the "Mr. Baker's trap" of old days —
since that coroner's time called, witii more sentiment
and less wit, the Bridge of Sighs. Here the hfe-weary,
and those drunk enough to feel so, from all Wapping,
Shadwell, and Ratcliff flung over into the foul dock-fluid,
and were drowned and losl^ or fished out, dead or alive
as the case might be, with boat-hooks. Mostly they
were women. And there were so many that a policeman
on that beat would stop and watch any woman as she
crossed the bridge, and would hasten to move on one
who showed a sign of hngering.

Now no poUceman was in sight; no man but one, a
hulking shadow, half visible up a foul passage. Down
on the rail of the bridge a woman cowered, thinly clothed
and almost shoeless, clutching the iron with both hands,
and turning her eager, haggard face this way and that
as she listened.

ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE. 123

From along the lane came the sound of a slow, heavy
tramp. A policeman I The woman rose and hurried
toward the deeper shadow by the dock-wall. No — not
a policeman; a home-going lighterman with heavy new
water-boots. The woman hesitated and stopped. There
were other, fainter footsteps farther off. Now — or wait?
Now. She ran back to the middle of the bridge, seized
the rail, fiung her knee upon it and rolled over.

There was a great splash and a shriek. Bill Hamell,
slow and heavy ashore, was deft and active in sight of
water. From bis trudge he broke into a clangorous run,
and swung down by the bridge-foot to the quay. There
was no boat and no long hook. In an instant his thick
coat was off, and sitting on it, he tore off bis heavy
boots, dropped them on the spot, and dived. Some-
thing floated in the shadow of the bridge, and for that
he swam. It was the woman, floating still, and shriek-
ing, though now but faintly. He took her by the hair
and turned for the quay steps. She made no trouble
by way of dinging and clutching, for which Bill was
duly thankful; for he had rescued before, in the river.
Up the steps he dragged her by the armpits and set
her down. There he left her, and took to staring about
the quay paving: for the black heap of coat and boots
was no longer there.

His glance rose from bis feet, and lo! up by the
bridge-foot, her single skirt tJutched about her knees,

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124 DIVERS VANITIES.

scuttled the woman, nimble though dripping, and vanished
in the fou! passage, where now no hulking shadow was.
Two seconds more of storing, and Bill followed in his
wet socks. But the passage was empty. It led into an
alley; the alley was empty also. Bill Hamell returned,
and found a stranger or two.

"Lor* I" said an immense woman who kept her
hands under her apron. "Done 'im for 'is boots, pore
bloke. What a shamel"

"Wet, mate?" asked another, kindly.

"It's jist the same ol' game," pursued the first
"They done it afore, many's a time. It's water-boots
they tries for mostly. They ought t' 'ave six munse,
both on 'em — 'er an 'er bloke. She won't never be
drownded; swims like anythink!"

"Wot's 'er name?" demanded Bill, as the state of
the case grew apparent "Oo are they, an' where do
they live?"

The faces about him were instantly expressionless
as a brick wall. "No — we dunno, mate," came the
reply in far-away tones, "we dunno nothin' about 'em.
You go 'ome 'fore you ketch cold."

His teeth were chattering already. "An' if I'd 'a'
let 'er drownd," he mumbled dismally, "1 might 'a'
got five bob for finding' the body!" And this was the
truth.

D,mi,.=db, Google

INGRATES AT BAGSHAWS.

Though it was not in the main road Bagshaw's
was a place as well known as the parish church. It
was, indeed, in a by-street, but hard by the end that
joined the chief market of the neighbourhood. Bagshaw
was a chemist and druggist, and his shop, once filling
no more than the space of one room in a six-roomed
house, had grown into the houses on each side and up
toward their roofs, till, like a great flaming cancer, it
had assimilated and transformed the whole triple struc-
ture, and, with shop, storerooms, and what not, left but
one old room at the first-floor back that was unused by
way of trade. It was in this room that old Nye and
his wife bestowed themselves at night

Well it was for them, saJd many, that they had
fallen into the hands of such a man as Mr. Bagshaw:
else the workhouse had been their portion long since.
Old Nye had been a soldier, but all that now remained
of his soldering was a Crimean medal that was never
seen. He was a grey, neutral sort of old man, a docile
fulfiller of orders, prompted through the world by his
wife, and aimless away from her. She grew old, un-

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126 DIVERS VANITIES.

Steady, and peevish, as, indeed, did he. They snarled
at each other by fits, but they were never far apart.
To all who would see they stood a monument of Mr.
Bagshaw's zeal in good deeds. For twelve years and
more had they enjoyed of his charity the shelter of the
top back room, such cast-off clothes as could not be
sold, and a not infrequent shilling. On their part they

Scrubbed the floors,

Oeaned the windows and the paint.

Polished the brass plates,

Washed the bottles,

Swept,

Dusted,

Carried coals.

Cleaned stoves,

Washed towels and dusters,

Ran on errands,

Licked labels,
and when Mr. Bagshaw was too busy to go home at
midday they cooked chops and washed plates. When
it was muddy, too, old Nye cleaned Mr. Bagshaw's boots,
and when it was dry summer he refreshed the shop-
front with new paint What the old couple did with
their leisure was not known; some feared they wasted
it in idleness. Others held it ill that comfortable berths
should exist for them that had pensions, though most
knew that old Nye had none. He was not an interesting

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INGRATES AT BAGSHAW'S. 1 27

old soldier; he told no stories, and even his limp, he
said, he got from falling off a ladder. When first he
came under Mr. Bagshaw's protection he would have
liked to wear his medal on his waistcoat, as he had done
aforetime; but Mr. Bagshaw taught him that he should
rather be ashamed of having once given himself to the
trade erf murder, and the medal was hidden shame-
facedly away.

For Mr. Bagshaw was a man of influence among
the meaner minds about him : an elevating force through
all Bow. Not a chapel revival meeting but was the goodlier
and the juicier for his fervid exhortings— even for his
presence: not a prayer-meeting but gained in desert by
his copious invocations. He had become stout and
round-faced in his prosperity, but the face was pale,
smooth, and flat, and bore no trace of any bodily in-
dulgence that was not respectable. He walked in the
street with his head thrown back, the cape of his Inver-
ness cloak flung wide over his shoulders, black silk lin-
ing outward, and his expression that of joyous piety-
Altogether a man of great popular account. He was a
guardian of the poor, and in that capacity had long
maintained a dignified struggle against oakum picking
in the casual ward: a task dishonouring to the workers,
a thing destructive of the dignity of labour and an in-
sult to the higher humanity. More, he was a vestry-
man: and the navvies found him a ready champion in

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128 DIVERS VANITIES.

their protest against the use of pauper labour on the
roads. So that hts virtues vere not unregarded of the
people, and, indeed, he had his reward, even in busi-
ness. In his shop, withal, his excellence shone un-
dimmed. He had no medical or surgical qualifications,
yet he freely gave the best advice he could to the suf-
fering poor who came for drugs, and not one was sent
empty away, so long as he had some money to offer,
however little, for medicine For, once the sum avail-
able were ascertained, it were hard indeed if something
could not be made up that should come within the
price, and moreover, leave the shade of profit that was
Mr. Bagshaw's just due. But some payment there must
be, for then was the beneficiary's self-respect and in-
dependence maintained; and there was no credit, for
debt destroyed the moral fibre. It is the duty of a
philanthropist to consider such things for his ignorant
neighbours.

And so Mr. Bagshaw, diligent in his business, pros-
pered in well-doing. Even his maintenance of Old
Nye and his wife was not all loss. In addition to the
services their natural gratitude prompted them to render,
there came two several five-pound notes from an officer
of Nye's old regiment whose servant the old man had
been, and these went some way toward repayment for
their lodging and expenses, which, indeed, were not
over-large after all. Moreover, there was no necessity

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

INGRATES AT BAGSHAW'S. 1 29

for a boy, nor for a charwoman. Still, there were vexa-
tions. The Nyes grew old and ineffectual. Their ad-
miration of their patron's discourses and invocadons led
them to his chapel in clothes that were disgraceful to a
respectable place of worship, and reflected discredit on
himself; to these intrusions, however, he put an end.
Then it was found Ihat Nye had pawned his old silver
watch — had gone straight from Mr, Bagshaw's establish-
ment into a low pawnshop, and had probably been seen.
True, he was penitent, when taxed with the fault, but
the thing was done.

But chiefly, the old couple aged fast. There came
a time when old Nye was unsafe on the steps as he
cleaned the windows, and when, in fact, the windows
were very ill cleaned. His sight was bad, too, and he
knocked down jars. He grew slow on errands, and
forgot them half-way. Once he broke a window as he
staggered by with a shutter; he could not carry a scuttle
without dropping a trail of coal, and bottles, in the
washing, shpped from his shaking hands and smashed.
The mild young shop assistant helped him, but he had
work of his own, and there was no concealing the old
man's growing uselessness. He felt it himself, and
strove to hide it in a show of alacrity and nimbleness
that made things worse. As for the old woman, though
her wits remained the clearer, she failed otherwise worse
than he. She would drop in a heap from her chronic

u,Mz=<i„ Google

I30 DIVHIS VANITIES.

rheumatism, and her share of the charing would fall to
be done by Old Nye, unequal to his own. Old Nye
and his missis were worn out

Clearly, the thing could not go on thus. Bagshaw's
with smeared windows, half-polished brass, dirty fioois
— it would never do. Somebody else must be found to
do the work. Certainly it would come more expensive,
but it could not be helped; and by the favour of pro-
vidence the business could well afford it The question
was how to get rid of old Nye and his wife. Popular
as Mr. Bagshaw was, a little thing might destroy the
general remembrance of his years of patient benignity.
Fortunat^y a way presented itself.

Not far from Bagshaw's was a pubUc-house where
forms and trestle-tables still stood in front as they had
done when Bow was a green village. Old Nye was
passing this place on some dimly-remembered errand,
when a greengrocer's man said to three soldiers with
whom he sat: "Look at that; '€"5 a old soldier — Crimea.
Ain't very bloomin', is 'e, not to look at?" Old Nye
heard himself hailed, and one of the soldiers, reaching
out, seized him by the arm. '"Scuse me, sergeant,
you're going past the canteen. Come — don't be proud,
if we art on'y young 'uns." And he drew old Nye to
the seat beside him.

The old man would not stay long, for he had his
errand, and must not seem slow. He was dull and

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

INGRATES AT BAGSfUW'S. I3I

preoccupied, and only answered, "Thank ye kindly,"
and replied to whatever was said with doubtful stammers
and mumbhngs. But the beer comforted him, and pre-
sently he went his way with firmer steps.

Few of her neighbours' faults escaped the eyes and
ears of Mrs, Webster, moralist Indeed, she had ob-
served the whole circumstances of old Nye's detention,
fix>m the door of the adjoining greengrocer's. Deter-
mined that Mr. Bagshaw should at least know how his
forbearance was abused, she hastened at once to that
philanthropist with a full report. Was it right that his
dependant should thus openly disgrace him, carousing
with common soldiers before a public-house?

Deeply pained as Mr. Bagshaw was, he saw his
duty cleariy. The Nyes must go. If all his years of
patient effort had failed to arouse in them the proper
moral sense, then the attempt was futile. Sorrowfully,
but with unmistakable firmness, he announced his deter-
mination to old Nye. The old man stared and gulped,
and clutched at the counter with the nearer hand. His
gaze wandered round the shop and he mumbled dis-
mally, but he said nothing. Having discharged a painful
duty with a proper observance, Mr. Bagshaw retired be-
hind the shop.

It was at least an hour ere old Nye came to Mr.
Bagshaw, and, feebly and with a trembling dryness of
the mouth, besought a reconsideration — at least a respite.
9"

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132 DIVERS VANITIES.

His wife was bad just then (she was, indeed, in bed at
the moment) but would be better soon. They separated
man and wife in the workhouse; and, perhaps, in a little
while he could find another place. He was truly sorry;
it should not occur again; and so forth. But Mr. Bag-
shaw's resolve was not to be shaken by mere words.
This much he conceded nevertheless: that the pair should
stay till the end of the week. For he reflected that
he was not yet prepared with anyone to succeed
them.

Old Nye did his futile best with the duties of both
till Friday, when the old woman appeared again and
went about her work as she had not done for months;
so that Mr. Bagshaw half thought of the possibility of
Tceeping her without her husband. In the dinner-hour,
while Mr. Bagshaw was away, she talked to the mild
assistant with deferential (lattery, offered to clean down
his shelves behind the dispensing screen, and asked a
respectful question or two about the drugs she found
there. At closing-time that night as the assistant
reached his coat he heard old Nye say in the back
scullery: —

"There'll be the brass to dean fiist thing in the
momin'; I'll go down the yard an' mix the ile and
brick-dust ready."

"Not to-night," answered the old woman. "Rest now,
Tom."

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INGRATES AT BAGSHAW'S. I33

The mild assistant had never heard old Nye's
Christian name before.

In the morning the assistant found the shutters still
up. He carried a key of the shcq) door, however, and
passed in. Nobody was about He called up the stairs
and out into the yard, but was not answered. Then he
went up to the door of the little bedroom and knocked
vigorously. Stilt there was no sound. He called. The
door was not locked, so presently he pushed it open.

The blind was down, and the old iron bedstead,
with its ragged heap of bed, lay in shadow. There
was a close smell of guttered candle, and another smell,
slighter and subtler. He pulled the blinds aside, and
the light fell on a pillow and on a roan's face, livid, blue,
and staring, with set teeth and &othy lips. He started
back, tearing the rotten blind from its roller; and there
on the bed's edge, as in act of mounting it, lay huddled
another body, trailing to the ftoor a skinny shank, knotted
and monstrous at the knee.

He ran into the street, aghast and shouting. People
gathered and policemen came. When the stairs were
mounted again the smell of guttered candle was still to
be perceived, but the fainter scent of prussic add had
fled on the fresher air. Under the woman's clenched
hand lay a blue phial with a staring label. It was one,
the assistant saw, (com a shelf behind the dispensing

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134 DIVERS VANITIES.

screen. When they came to look at the spot whence it
had been taken, there, in a little heap, lay a pierced
penny-piece, three halfpence, and a blackened old
Crimean medal.

Sympathy for Mr. Bagshaw was general through all
Bow.

D,mi,.=db,Gooiilc

RHYMER THE SECOND.

Bill Wragg, dealer in all creatures in size between
that of a donkey and that of a mouse, but chiefly
merchant of dogs, keeps a little shop on the right of a

stable-entry in well, in London. He has taken me

into his confidence, and there may be reasons why he
would not like to see his precise address in print Bill
is a stoutish man of forty-five, with a brown, shaven face
that looks very soft and pufly under the eyes and hard
as rock everywhere else. He is a prosperous man
nowadays, as prosperity goes in the dog and guinea-pig
line, and he has a sort of semi-detached assistant, a
lightly junior creature of his own kind, whose name is
Sam. Sam's other name is sometimes Brown, sometimes
Series, and sometimes Walker; and sometimes Sam is
Bill's accredited agent, and sometimes he doesn't even
know him by sight

Bill Wragg, as I have said, has now and again taken
me into his confidence, in an odd, elHptic, non-committal
manner that is all his own. Thus I have learned how,
in the b^inning of things, he started business in the
parrot line with no money and no parrots; of how he

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136 DIVERS VANITIES,

set up, aAer this first transaction, with a capital of five
shillings and an empty bird-cage; and other such pro-
fessional maUers. Among them was the story of a
champion fox-terrier which he once possessed, from which
he had made a very respectable profit, and to which he
looked back with much pride.

Bill sat on the edge of his rat-pit as he told the
story, while I, preferring the society of Bill's best bull-
pup before that of the few hundred squirming creatures
that wriggled and fought a foot below Bill's coat-tails,
used the upturned basket that was the seat of honour
of the place.

"That little bit o' business," said Bill, "was one o'
my neatest, an' yet it was simple an' plain enough for
any chap as was properly up in the lor about dawgs;
any other cove might ha' made 'is honest fifty quid or
so just the same way if he'd ha' thought of it; might do
it now a'most — anyway if there was a mad-dt^ scare on,
like what there was when I done this. It was jist this
way. Me an' Sam, we was a-lookin' through the Crystal
Palace Show when we sees quite a little crowd in the
middle 0' the fox-terrier bench. 'Oh, what a love!'
says one big gal. 'What a darlio'!' says another, 'He's
a good dawg if you like,' says a swell. All a-puttin' on
the mighty fly, ye know, 'cos they could see 'Fust Prize'
stuck up over the dawg, so he was pretty sure to be a
good 'un. ' 'E M a good pup, sure enough,' says Sam,

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

RHYMER THE SECOND. 137

when we got past the crowd; 'wait till them swells hooks
it, an' see.' An' right enough, 'e was jist the best fox-
terrier under the twelve-month that ever I see, in a show
or out Sharp an' bright as a bantam; lovely 'ead;
legs, back, chest, fust-rate everywhere; an' lor', what a
neck I Not a bad speck on 'im. Well — there, you know
what 'e is! Rhymer the Second; fit to win anywhere
now, though 'e's getting a bit old."

I knew the name very well as that of a dog that had
been invincible in fox-terrier open classes a few years
back. It was news to me that Bill Wragg had ever
possessed such a dc^ as th^

"Rhymer the Second," Bill repeated, biting off a
piece &om the straw he was chewing and beginning at
the other end. "Though I called 'im Twizzler when 'e
was mine. Pure Bardlet strain, an' the best that ever
come from it An' 'ere 'e was, fiist in puppy class, fust
in novice class, fast in limit class, an' all at fust go."

"'Eh?' says Sam, 'that's about yer sort, ain't it?'

" 'Why, yus,' I says, "e's a bit of all right I could
do very nice with 'im,' I says.

"Sam grins, artfiil like. 'Well, ye never know yer
luck,' he says. An' I was a-beginnin' to think things
over."

Mr. Wra^ drew another straw from a sack by his
side and resumed.

"So we went an' bought a catdogue, an' I went on

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138 DIVERS VANITIES.

a-thinltin' things over. 1 thought 'em over to that ex-
tent that I fell r^'lar io love with that little dawg, an'
made up my mind I could pretty 'ardly live without 'int.
I am that sentimental, ye see, over a nice dawg. We
sees the owner's address in the catalogue, an' he was a
rare toff — r^'lar nob, with a big 'ouse over Sutton way,
breedin' fox-terriers for amusement Sam took a bit o'
trouble an' found out all about the ' ouse, an' 'e found
out that the swell kep' a boy that took out all the dawgs
for exerdse reg'lar every momin'. 'I thought as 'ow
you might like to 'ave jist one more fond look at 'im,'
says Sam.

"'Well, I think I should,' says I; 'an' maybe take
'im a little present — a bit o' liver or what not'

"So Sam borrowed a 'andy little pony-barrer, an'
next momin' me an' 'im went fer a drive over Sutton
way. We stops at a quiet, convenient sort o' comer by
a garden wall, where the boy alius come by with the
dawgs, an' Sam, what 'ad picked up a pore stray cat
close by, 'e stood off a bit farther on, like as though
'e'd never seen me afore in all his nat'ral.

"Well, we didn't have to wait very long afore the
boy comes along with a 'ole mob o' fox-terriers, all
nmnin' all over the shop, 'cept two or three young 'uns
on leads, an' givin' the boy all he could do to keep 'em
together, I can tell ye. There was veiy nigh a score in
the crowd, but I picked out my litUe beau^ at once,

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

RHVHEtt TBE SECOND. I39

an' there 'e was, trottin' along nice and genelmanly jist
where I vanted 'im, a bit behind most on 'em, Jist as
the boy goes past me I ketches my little beauty's eye
an' whips out my Httle present — a nice bit 0' liver with
just a louch o' fakement on it, you understand — just
enough to fetch 'im. At the same moment Sam, in
front, 'e somehow lets go the pore stray cat, an' off goes
the 'ole bloomin' pack o' terriers arter 'er, an' the boy
arter ihem, hollerin' an' whippin' like fun — all 'cept my
little beauty, as was more took up with my little bit o'
Kver. See?"

I saw, and the old rascal's eyes twinkled with pride
in the neatness of his larceny,

"Well, that cat made sich a fair run of it, an' the
dawgs went arter 'er at sich a spht, that in about 'arf
a quarter of a minute my pore little beauty was 3 lost
dawg with nobody in the world to take care of 'im but
me an' Sam. An' in about 'arf a quarter of a minute
more 'e was in a nice warm basket with plenty o' straw,
a-havin' of a ride 'ome in the pony-barrer jist as fast as
the pony could take 'im. I ain't the cove to leave a
pore httle dawg all alone in the world."

Here I laughed, and Bill Wragg's face assumed an
expression of pained surprise. "Well, no more I ain't,"
he said. "Look what a risk I was a-takin' all along of
a romantical attachment for that dawg. Why, I might
ha' bin 'ad up for sltaltn' 'im!"

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

I40 DIV

I banished unseemly mirth and looked very serious.
"So you might," I said, "Terribie. Go on. Did you
bring him home?"

" 'E accompanitd us, sir, all the way. When we took
'im out 'e was just a bit shy-like at bein' in a strange
place, but as well as ever. I says to the missis, I says,
' 'Ere's a pore little lost dawg we've found. I think e's'
a pretty good 'un,'

"'Ah!' says she, 'that 'e is,' The missis 'as got a
pretty good eye for a dawg — for a woman! 'That 'e
is,' says she. 'Are ye goin' to keep 'im?'"

"'Keep 'im?' says I. 'No,' I says, 'not altogether.
That wouldn't be honest I'm a-goin' to buy 'im, legal
an' honourable.'

"'Buy 'im?' says the missis, not tumblin' to the
racket 'Buy 'im? 'Ow?'

'"Buy 'im cheap,' says I, 'in about a month's time.
'E'd be too dear jist at present for a pore 'ard-workin'
chap like me. But we'll keep 'im for a month in case
we're able to find out the owner. Pity wc can't afford
to feed "im very well,' I says, 'an' o' course 'e mt'gii get
a touch o' mange or summat — but thafs luck. All
you've got to do is to keep 'im close when I'm out, an'
take care 'e don't get lost again.'

"So we chained 'im up amongst the rest for that
night, an' we kep' 'im indoors for a month on the chain.
0' course, bein' a pore man, I couldn't afford to feed

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

RHYMER THE SECOND. I4I

'im as well as the others — 'im bein' another man's dawg
as could well afford to keep 'im, an' ought never to ha'
bin so careless a-losin' of 'im. An' besides, a dawg kep'
on the chain for a month don't want so much grub as
one as gits exerdse. Anybody knows that An' what's
more, as I was a-goin' to buy 'im reg'lar, the wuss con-
dition 'e got in the cheaper 'e'd come, ye see. So if we
did starve 'im a bit, more or less, it was all out of affec-
tion for 'im. An' we let 'is coat go any'ow, an' we give
it a touch of a little fakement I know about that makes
it go patchy an' look like mange — though it's easy enough
got rid of. An' so we kep' 'im for a month, an' 'e got
seedier eveiy day; an', o' course, we never 'eard any-
thing from the swell at Sutton.

"Well, at the end o' the month the little dawg looks
pretty mis'rable an' taper. An', to say nothink o' the
mangy coat an' bad condition, all 'is spirit an' carriage
was gone, an' you know as 'ow spirit an' carriage is arf
the pints in a fox-terrier. So I says to the missis, 'Come,'
I says, 'I'm about tired o' keepin' another man's dawg
for nothink. Jist you put a string on 'im an' take 'im
round to the p'lice-station.'

"'What?' says the missis. 'Why, I thought you was
a-goin' to buy him!' For ye see she 'adnt tumbled to
the racket yet

'"Never you mind,' says 1; 'you git yer bonnet an'
do what I tell you.'

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142 DIVERS VANITIES.

"So the missis gits her bonnet an' puts a string cm
Rhymer the Second (which looked anythink but a winner
by this time, you may bet) an' goes off to the p'lice-
station. She'd got her tale all right, o' course, from me,
all about the stray dawg that bad bin follerin' 'er, an'
seemed so 'uogiy, pore thing, an' wouldn't go away, an'
that she was 'arf afraid of. So they took 'im in, o'
course, as dooty bound, an' put 'im along of the other
strays, an' the missis she come 'ome without 'im,

"Well, Sam gives a sort o' casual eye to the p'lice-
station, an' next momin' 'e sees a bobby go off with the
strays what had been collected — about 'arf-a-doz«i of
'em— with our Uttie chap among 'em, to the Dawgs'
'Ome. Now, in understandio' my little business specula-
tion, you must remember that this was in the thick o'
the muzzlin' rage, when the p'hce was very Strict, an'
the Dawgs' 'Ome was full enough to bust I knowed
the ropes o' the thing, an' I knowed pretty well what
'ud 'appen. The littJe dawg 'ud be took in among the
others in the big yard where they keep all the little 'uns,
a place cram jam full o' other dawgs about 'is size an'
condition, so as it ain't alius easy to tell t'other from
which. There 'e'd stop for three days — no less an' no
more, unless 'e was claimed or bought If 'e wasn't
either claimed or bought at the end o' three days, into
the oven 'e went, an' there was an end of 'im. Mind
you, in ordinary the good 'uns 'ud be picked out an'

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

RHYMER THE SECOND. I43

nussed up an' what not, an' sold better; but these busy
days there was no time an' no conveniences for that, an'
they 'ad to treat all alike. So that I was pretty sure
anyway that the Sutton swell 'ad made 'is visit long ago,
an', o' course, found nothink. So next day I says to the
missis, 'Missis, I've got another job for you. There's a
pore httle lost dawg at the Dawgs' 'Ome I want ye to
buy. You'll git him for about five bob. 'E looks pretty
mudi off colour, I expect — 'arf starved, with a touch o'
mange; an' 'e's a fox-terrier.'

"When the missis tumbled to it at last I thought
she'd ha' bust 'erself a-1aughin'. 'Lor", Bill,' she says,
'you — well there — you are! I never guessed what you
was a-drivin' at!'

"'AH right,' says I, 'you know now, anyway, Ktch
your mug a bit more solemn than that an' sling out
arter the dawg. An' mind,' I says, 'mind an' git the
proper receipt for the money in the orficc.'

'"Cos why? That's lor. /knowed all that afore I
begun the speculation. You go an' buy a dawg, fair an'
honest, at the Dawgs' 'Ome, an' get a receipt for yer
money, an' that dawg's youm — youm straight an' legal,
afore alt the judges of England, no matter whose that
dawg might ha' bin once. That's bin tried an' settled
long ago. Now you see my arrangement plain enough,
don't ye?"

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144 DIVERS VANrnes.

"Yes," 1 said, "I think I do. A little rough on the
original owner, though, wasn't it?"

"Business — nothink but business! Why, bless ye,
I'd ha' bin in the workus long enough ago if I 'adnt
kep' a sharp eye to business. An', 101*, honesty's the
best policy, as this 'ere speculation shows ye plain. If
I'd ha' bin dishonest an' stole that dawg an' kep' it,
what good would it ha' bin to me? None at all. I
couldn't ha' showed it, I couldn't ha' sold it for more'n
a song, an' if I 'ad, why, it 'ud ha' bin spotted an' I'd
ha' bin 'ad up. Well, six months' 'ard ain't what I keep
shop for, an' it ain't business. But playin' the honest,
legal, proper game I made a bit, as you'll see.

"The missis she goes off to the Dawgs' 'Ome. Mind
you, they didn't know 'er. She only took die dawg to
the p'hce, an' the p'Kce took 'im to the 'ome. So the
missis goes to the 'ome with 'er tale all ready, an'
'Please, I want a little dawg,' she says, 'a nice, cheap
little dog for me an' my 'usband to make a pet of I
think I'd like one o' them little white 'uns,' she says; 'I
dunno what they call 'em, but I mean them little white
'uns with black marks.' She can pitch it in pretty in-
nocent, can the missis, when she likes.

"'Why,' says the man, 'I expect you mean a foK-
terrier. Well, we've got plenty o' them. Come this
way, mum, an' look at 'em.'

"So 'e takes 'er along to the yard where the little

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KHVHER THE SECOND. 143

'uns was, an' she looks through the bars an' pretty soon
she spots our little dawg not far of^ lookin' as bad as
any of 'era. 'There,' says she, 'that's the sort o' little
dawg I was a-thinking of, if 'e wouldn't come too dear
— that one there that looks so 'ungry, pore thing. I'd
keep 'im well fed, I would,' she says.

"Well, it was all right about the price, an' she got
'im for the five bob, an' got the receipt too, all reg'lar
an' proper, in the orfice. 'Vou ain't chose none so bad,
mum,' says the keeper, lookin' 'im over. "E's a very
good little dawg is that, only out o' condition. If we
'adn't bin so busy we'd ha' put 'im into better trira, an'
then 'e'd ha' bin dearer.'

"'Oh,' says the missis, 'then I couldn't 'ave afforded
to buy 'im; so I'm glad you didnt."

•"Well," says the man, 'there's no character with
'im, o' course, but I shouldn't be surprised if 'e was a
pedigree dawg.' 'E kuowed a thing or two, did that
keeper.

"So ye see the little dawg was mine, proper an'
legal Bein' mine, I could afford to treat 'im well, an'
precious soon, what with a dose or two o' stuff, carefijl
feeding, plenty o' exerdse, an' proper care 0' the coat,
Rhymer the Second was as bright an' 'andsome as ever.
Only we called 'im Twizzler for reasons o' business, as
youll understand. An' 'e comes on so prime that I
registers 'im, an' next show just round 'ere I enters 'im

Divtn Vanitiei. lO

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146 DIVERS VANITIES.

for every class 'e'd go in — open class, novice class, an'
limit class. And blowed if 'e didn't take fust in all of
'em, an' a special too! But there — 'e couldn't but win,
sich a beauty as 'e was; he ketches the judge's eye at
once. Aiier all the bad 'uns 'ad bin sent out o' the
ring it was all done — the judge couldn't leave ofif lookin'
at 'im. So there it was arter all — all the fusts for 'Mr.
W. Wragg's Twizzler, pedigree unknown. Not /or
Sale.'

"Well, that was pretty good, but there was more to
come. Just afore the show dosed I was a-lookin' round
witli Sam, when one 0' the keepers comes up with a
message from the sec't'ry. 'There's a gent canyin' on
like one o'clock,' says the keeper, 'about your fox-terrier.
Swears it's 'is as was stole from 'im awhile back, an' the
sec't'ry would like you to step over.'

"O' course, I was all ready, with the receipt snug
an' 'andy in my pocket, an' I goes over bold as brass.
There was the sec'f ry with 'is rosette, an' another chap
with 'is, an' a p'hceman an' a keeper, an' there was the
toff with gig-laraps an' a red face, a-shakin' of his fist
an' rantin' an' goin' on awful. 'I tell you that's my
dawg,' 'e says; 'the most valuable animal in my kennels,
stole while 'e was bein' exercised! Someone shall go to
gaol over this!' 'e says. 'Show me the man as en-
tered it!'

"'All right, guv'nor,' says I, calm an' peaceful,

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RHYMER THE SECOND. I47

'that's me; I entered 'im. Little dawg o' mine called
Twizzler. What was you a-sayin' about 'im?'

'"Why, the dog's mine, I teli you, you rascal!
Stolen in Febraary! And you've changed his name!
What '

"'Steady on, guv'nor,' I says, quiet an' dignified.
'You're excited an' rather insultin'. /ain't changed any
dawg's name. 'E 'adn't got no name when 1 bought
'im, an' I give 'im the one 'e's got now. An' as to 'is
bein' your dawg — well, 'e ain't, 'cos 'e's mine.'

" 'Then how did you come by him?' he says, madder
than ever.

"'Bought 'im, sir,' I says, 'reg'lar an' proper an'
legal. Bought 'im for five shiUin's.'

"Five shillings!' roars the toff. 'Why, that dog's
worth a hundred and fifty pounds! Here, where's a
policeman? I'll give him in chaise! I'll see this thing
through; I'll '

" 'Five bob was the price, guv'nor,' says I, quiet an'
genelmanly. 'Though I've no doubt you understand 'is
v^ue better than what I do. An' 'ere's my receipt,' I
says, 'Chat makes me 'is owner honest an' legal before
any judge in England!' An' I pulls out the paper.

'"Well, just look here,' says the sec't'ry, 'don't lefs
have any wrangling. There's a misunderstanding some-
where. You two gentlemen come into my office and see
if it can't be settled.' 'Cos, you see, a little crowd was

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148 DIVERS VANITIES.

a-gettin' rouad, an' the sec't'iy he see well enough 'ow I
stood. So we wallcs over to the orfice, me leadin' the
dawg along o' me, an' the toff puffin' an' blusterin' an'
goin' on like steam.

"'Come,' says tiie sec't'ry, pleasant an' cordial,
'you two gentlemen have a cigar with me, and a wtusky
and soda,' 'e says; 'and let's see if this litUe matter c^'t
be settled in a friendly way,' 'e says.

"'Well,' says I, 'I'm agreeable enough. Only what
can I do, when this 'ere genelman comes a-kickiu' up a
row an' daimin' my dawg, what fve bought legal an'
above-board? I can only tell honest 'ow I bought 'im,
an' show my legaJ receipt as proves what I say. Fm
civil enough to the genelman,' I says, 'ain't I?'

" 'Oh yes, 0' course,' says the sec't'ry. 'D'ye mind
lettin' me look at that receipt again? No doubt we'll
come to an arrangement.'

" 'There's the receipt, sir,' I says; 'Pm quite willin'
to trust it to you as an honourable genelman,' I says.

"So the sec't'iy 'as another look at the receipt, an'
'Just excuse us a moment, Mr. Wragg,' he says, an' 'e
goes aside with the toff an' begins talltin' it over quiet,
while I lit up an' 'ad my whisky an' soda. I should
think it was a bob cigar. I could just 'ear a word 'ere
an' there — 'No help for it,' 'TTiat's how it stands legally,'
'Think yourself lucky,' an' so on. An' at last they comes
over an' the sec't'ry says, 'Well, Mr. Wragg,' he says,

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

RHVMER THE SECOND. 1 49

'there's no doubt the dog's legally yours, as you say,
but this gentleman's willing to buy him of you, and
give you a good profit on your bargain. What do you
say?'

" 'Why,' I says, ' 'e ain't for sale. Von can see it
pimn enough on the catalogue.'

" 'Ob yes, of course, I know that,' says the sec't'ry.
'But we're men of the world here, men of business —
□one more so than yourself, Fm sure — and we can make
a deal, no doubt What do you say to twenty pounds?'

"'What?' says 1. 'Twenty pound? An' the genel-
man 'isself said the dawg was worth a hundred an' fifty
this very minute? Is it likely?' says I. 'Ad 'im there,
I think. 'It ain't reasonable,' I says.

"'H'm!' says the sec't'ry. 'He certainly did say
something about the dog being valuable. But just think.
It can't be worth much to you, with no pedigree.'

" 'It's worth jist what it 11 fetch to me,' I says, 'an'
no less.'

" 'Just so,' the sec't'ry says, 'but nobody^l give you
much for it with no pedigree, except this gentleman.
And, remember, you got it cheap enough.'

'"Well, I dunno about cheap,' I says, "E's bin a
deal of trouble to bring on an' git in condition,' I says.

'"Come, then,' says the sec't'ry, 'put your own price
on 'im. Now!'

'"I don't want to be 'ard on the gent,' I says, 'an'

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IJO DIVERS VANITIES.

seeing '6*3 took slch a fancy to the little dawg I'll do
•im a favour. I'll make a big reduction on the price 'e
put on 'im 'isself A hundred pound buys 'im,'

"When 'e 'eard that the toff bounces round atf
grabs 'is 'at, 'I won't be robbed twice hke that,' 'e
says, 'if I lose five hundred dogs," An' I begun to think
I might ha' ventured a bit too 'igh. 'I won't submit to
it,' says 'e.

"'Wait a moment,' says the sect'ry, soothin' like.
'Mr. Wragg's open to reason, I'm sure. You see, Mr.
Wra^, the gentleman won't go anything like as high,
and if he won't, nobody will. You won't take twenty.
Let's say thirty, an' finish the business.'

"Well, we goes on 'agglin' till at last we settles it at
fifty.

"'All right,' I says, when I see it wouldn't run to
no more. "Ave it yer own way. I don't want to
stand in the way of a genelman as is took sich a fancy
to a little dawg — I'm so sentimental over a dawg myself,'

"So the toff, he pulls out 'is cheque-book an' writes
out a cheque on the spot 'There,' says the sect'ry,
'that little misunderstanding's settled, an' I congratulate
you two gentlemen. You've made a very smart bargain,
Mr- Wragg, an' you've got a dog, sir, that I hope will
repay you welll'

"An' so the toff went off with the little dawg, an' I

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

RHYMER THE

went off with the fifty quid, both well pleased enough.
An' the dawg did pay 'im well, as you can remember.
'E was a lucky chap, was that toff. / never see sich a
good dawg bought so cheap before. I ought to ha' got
more for 'im, I think — but there, I am so sentimental
about a dawg!"

D,mi,.=db,Gooiilc

CHARLWOOD "WITH A NUMBER.

Mr. Robert Chahlwood's house was the curiosity of
its neighbourhood. It was a comfortable and wdl-con-
ditioned house enough, standing in ground of its own,
topmost on the hill of a high London suburb. But Mr.
Charlwood had crowned the house (and consequentiy
the hill) with curious superstructures, square, p(»nt^
domed, ribbed, zinc-covered, piwced with apertures of
weird design; structures some of which, it was reported,
had been observed, in the twilight and dark of dear
evenings, to shift and turn about on their axes, by the
operation of no visible agency. Also there was a strange
and contorted construction, like a pile of vast canisters,
which dung irregularly to one side of the house, and
was allt^ed to be a covered staircase leading from Mr.
Charlwood's study to the roof. All of which prodigies
were explained by iht simple fact that Mr. Charlwood
was an astronomer.

It might be said — it was said, in fact — that Mr,
Charlwood was not so much a great as a persistent
astronomer; I have heard it more than hinted, indeed,
that he was not a great astronomer at all Such rumoura

CHARLWOOD WITH A NUMBER. 153

as these never disturbed him, however, because he never
heard them; for he was aa astroaomical hermit A more
than middle-aged, quite well-to-do, and not particularly
ascetic hermit, but a hermit nevertheless. He wrote and
printed a great many capital letters after his name, of
which few people could guess the precise significance.
These letters cost him a good number of guineas a year,
for they were the initials of all sorts of societies, member-
ship in which was strictly confined to any gentlemen
who would pay the subscriptions. Some came quite
reasonable, considering the number of letters, and the
dearest were only five guineas per annum. I heard of
one, indeed, which gave you four initials for a guinea,
but this was a very common affair, and I believe Mr,
Charlwood's letters of honour averaged out at fourteen
and ninepencc apiece, taking one with another; a far
more respectable price, though not at all excessive.

He was the author of many contributions to the
chief scientific journals, their inability to print which —
for reasons they carelessly left unexplained — caused
great regret to the editors; and his lecture explaining
edipses, before the Parson's Green Debating Society,
greatly stirred that learned body. On one occasion a
daily newspaper had actually printed a letter from him
giving the time and particulars of the appearances of a
curious light in die sky, thought possibly to have been
a manifestation of the Aurora Bortalis; aad there is

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154 DIVERS VAMITIES,

every reason to believe that the same newspaper would
also have published his account of his observation, through
his large telescope, of an extraordinary ascending flight
of meteors, if he had sent it; and he would undoubtedly
have sent it but for a certain misgiving ensuing on his
descent from the observatory and his reception of a re-
port that the kitchen chimney had been on fire. "It's
a mercy the fire-engines haven't been here, sir," his
housekeeper said; "die sparks were enough to bring 'em
five miles."

It was to the management of this Mrs. Page, his
housekeeper, that Mr. Charlwood owed the equable re-
gularity of his life. He was wholly unconscious of the
debt, and by years of use and habit he had grown to
regard his household as a sort of unchanging, pre-
ordained Planetary System. Mrs. Page, the cook, the
two housemaids, and the parlourmsud were all elderly
and long-established servants, and so was the gardener
and odd-man. They revolved decorously and punctually
about himself, the sun of the system; the resulting phe-
nomena of shaving-water, breakfast, lunch, tea, dinner,
dusting, firclighting and lawn-mowing occurring with the
exact and mechanical precision of the tides, the seasons,
and the phases of the moon. There was an occasional
eclipse, in the form of a chimney-sweeping or spring
cleaning, and the kitchenmaid and the boot-boy came
and went and changed erratically; but Mr. Charlwood

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

charlwood with a number- 155

saw little of thena, and regarded them merely as irre-
sponsible comets, with irregular orbits, striking in from
outer space and away again, with no material disturb-
ance to the solid planets about him. So he went his
unchanging way, sleeping, rising, shaving, eating, read-
ing, writing, astronomising, all to the tick of the clock, and
one day and the next were as like as two full moons.
Mrs. Page, visibly and invisibly, inspired and regulated
the system throughout, and the smallest change in the
exact order of the daily round would have affected Mr.
Charlwood much as an astral catastrophe would have
affected the tables in the Nautical Almanac For many
years, however, Mrs. Page saw that nothing 90 offensive
as change of the smallest sort occurred in the Charlwood
system.

But at last things began to go wrong suddenly. Mr,
Charlwood descended to the bathroom one morning, and
there found the wrong soap. There was nothing to com-
plain of in the soap itself — indeed, it was a cake of the
same kind that had always occupied the soap-dish in his
bedroom wash-stand — but it was not the sort of soap
that ancient custom had sanctified for Mr. Charlwood's
bathroom use. That was in a square cake, and this was
oval. That was white, and this was pink; moreover, the
smell was altt^ther different Mr. Charlwood did not
discover the anomaly till he was in the bath, and it was
too late to complain; and after he was dressed it slipped

156 DIVERS VANITIES.

bis memory till he beheld the same soap in the same
place the next morning. It was annoying and dis-
tressing, but he somehow forgot it again.

At any rate he forgot it till lunch, when the claret
reminded htm. It was cold — it positivdy chilled the
teeth; and if one thing had been more regular than an-
other in Mr. Charlwood's house, it was the temperature
of Mr. Charlwood's clareL He reproved the parlour-
maid, and sent it away, but his lunch was wholly ruined.

Mrs. Page presented herself after lunch, and apo-
logised. She had been in the habit of seemg to the
proper warming of the claret, it seemed, but to-day some-
thing had distracted her attention, and she had forgotten it

Mr. Charlwood sat indignant, but far more amazed.
It was as though the Pole Star had "fotgotten" its cor-
rect place at the tip of the Little Bear's tail. Cold
claret — it seemed an impossibihty; yet here it was. And
at dinner that evening it came up — how do you think?
Hot, sir, hteially hot; parboiled! The whole thing was
an outrage on the laws of nature. But even worse was
to follow. When he demanded Mrs. Page, he was told
that she had just "stepped out" The chief planet of
the system had just "stepped out" of its orbit — had
gone swirling off into space in flat defiance of the law of
gravitation! Mr. Charlwood bounced angrily into his
study, and there found — no matches on the mantelpiece!

When he could consider these abnormities with some

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CHARLWOOD WITH A NUMBER. I57

degree of calmness, it seemed dear enough that some-
thing must be wrong with Mrs. Page; and yet it could
scarcely be her health, or she would not have gone out
He resolved to demand an explanation in the morning.

In the morning, however, she forestalled him by ask-
ing for a few days' leave. She got the question out —
very anxiously and gulpily, it is true — before Ue had
time to open his inquiries, and, having heard it, he was
dumb for half a minute, losing all hold of his ideas.
Imi^e asking Jupiter to give an indefinite holiday to
his largest moon!

Whoi be found his voice, it was a voice of scan-
dalised protest "Mrs. Pagel" he said, "Mrs. Page!
Really I don't understand this extraordinary state of
things. What do you mean by it?"

Mrs. Page's mouth screwed down at the comers, and
her eyes — rather red and heavy, he noticed now — grew
pleading and watery. "I — I don't like to ask you, sir,"
said Mrs. Page, "and I've put it off as long as I could,
but I must ask you to let me go now. I'll sec the cook,
and "

"But what, Mrs. Page — why — what is the reason of
this extraordinary — this — in short, Mrs. Page, what is
your explanation?"

"Well, Mr, I didn't want to mention it, not wishing to
trouble you, as you didn't know; but it's my mother."

"Your mother, Mrs. Page?"

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158 DIVERS VANITIES.

"Yes, sir." Mrs. Page, tearful of eye, spoke with an
air of meek apology for having been bom of woman.

Mr. Charlwood's surprise was complete Mrs. Page
was certainly as old as himself, and his mother was no
more than a recollection of childhood. There was some-
thing difficult to believe — ^something vaguely ridiculous
— about Mrs. Page's tardy retention of a mother.

"Then, what is it, Mrs. Page? Why must you go
because of your — your mother?"

"She's an invalid, sir, and — got nobody to look
after her for the present, and I — I — oh, I don't know
what I shall do!" And here Mrs. Page broke down
wholly and dabbed her red eyes with a fistful of wet
pocket-handkerchief.

Mr. Charlwood regarded his housekeeper with blank
astonishment She was exhibiting phenomena altogether
foreign to his experience of planets. He asked more
questions, and so the tale came out disconnectedly in
sobs and jerks.

Mrs. Page's mother had been left a widow only a
little earlier than Mrs. Page herself. Of late years she
had become bedridden with spine trouble, and, to the
worse of that, was nearly blind. Mrs. Page had taken
lodgings for her, and a woman had been paid to give
her attention; but now the small savings of mother and
daughter had at length given out, and the attendant was
gone; and it was Mrs. Page's present care to move her

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CHARLWOOD WITH A NUMBER. I59

mother to cheaper lodgings, if such could be found, and
in some way to attempt the impossible in the way of
providing attendance on her. This must be the work of
a few days, and Mrs. Page humbly and tearfully, but
with more insistence than she had ever dared to use to
her employer before, protested that she really must go.

So much Mr. Charlwood gathered from Mrs. Page's
faltering apol<^etics, but she said nothing of the weeks
of deepening apprehension which had preceded the
crisis, while the last few sovereigns, feebly reinforced by
the last month's wages, had been melting fast; nor of
the sleepless, sore-eyed nights given to helpless scheming
of hopeless expedients. And Mr. Charlwood was not
the man to figure them in his imagination, for, in truth,
that was not a quality wherewith he was vastly endowed.
So he replied with dignified asperity.

"Have you considered, Mrs. Page," he said, "what —
ah — extreme difficulty and inconvenience, and, in fact,
positive annoyance, your absence would cause to the —
to me?"

Yes, it seemed that Mrs. Page had considered this,
and was very sorry. But she had made arrangements
to mitigate the inconvenience as far as possible, and —
in short, she really must go. Mr. Charlwood's amaze-
ment increased; he began to realise that his housekeeper
was insisting — was growing firm — dictatorial. This was
disconcerting — even alarming. Mr. Charlwood suddenly

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l6o DIVERS VANinES.

grew aware that a vast deal more of his habitual well-
being tbaa he could risk depended wholly on his house-
keeper; he positively could not afibrd to offend her.
What was to be done?

The sooner this nuisance was got rid of the better.
He reflected that when a similar difficulty arose in a
matter of astronomy — when one planet of a system was
observed to be distracted from its proper orbit by the
influence of some unknown object outside the system,
every astronomer turned his telescope in the direction
of the unknown object in the hope of seeing it It was
all he had to guide him, and time was predous. He
pushed his chair back and rose.

"Very well, Mis. Page," he said. "Get your bonnet
at once. I will come with you and see this mother of
yours I"

Mrs. Page's red eyes opened wide. Hers was the
amazement now. She stammered the b^imtings of pro-
test and then was silent. Could it be that Mr. Chart-
wood doubted her word?

"I will come and see this mother of yours, Mrs.
Page I" he repeated.

Mrs. Page left the room with something of a woe-
begone flounce

At the foot of the hill, where the houses stood
smaller and thicker, a street led out of the main road,

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CHARLWOOD WITH A NUMBER. l6l

and another street led out of that The end of this
street was in another, wherein, if you turned to the right,
you proceeded to I don't know where, and if you turned
to the left, yoif could get no farther, because the street
ended in a blind wall. At the end little house, next the
blind wall, in a back room up the one flight of stairs,
Mrs. Page's old mother lay pallid and helpless and all
but blind on a dean little bed on an iron bedstead with
thin and staggering 1^. So Mr. Charlwood and his
housekeeper found her half ao hour after their morning
conversation. Most things in the room were difficult to
distinguish at first, for the blind was drawn; but the
white of the bed was distinct enough, and on that an-
other white — the old woman's face, hard and sharp and
shocking, with eyes all but dosed by lids that trembled
unceasingly.

"Is that you, Martha?" came a querulous voice from
the bed. "A nice time to leave me here Uke this, I
must say, and not a soul to do a thing for me!"

Mrs. Page bent and kissed the drawn face, quickly
whispering something in which Mr. Charlwood could dis-
tinguish npthing but his own name. The twist of pain
that abode ever on the grey face deepened at the words,
and the old woman made what seemed a great effort to
sit up, ending in a short groan.

"And pray," came the sharp voice again, "pray,

Bivtrt VaiiHin. r •

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

l62 DIVERS VANITIES.

may I ask why Mr. Charlwood is so good as to pay me
this uninvited visit?"

Mrs. Page stooped again and murmured some agonised
entreaty, but the helpless woman in the bed went on.

"I cannot pretend that the time is convenient," she
said. "And I hope it is not at your request, Martha.
Mr. Charlwood is surely aware that the temporary cir-
cumstances which have induced you to accept a position
in his household, and which have made it convenient
for me to occupy these very inadequate lodgings, are
not such as would warrant any attitude of patronage on
his part"

Mrs, Page left the bed-head and returned to Mr,
Charlwood by the door, pleading in whispers. "Please
go, sir," she begged. "She doesn't know; she doesnt
understand — I've never told her quite how things are,
and she's been used to something different; pray forgive
her, Mr, Charlwood, and — and don't stay. You see it's
true— I must do something, though I don't know what
Please leave me with her."

Mr. Charlwood found himself on the stairs, with
some confused consciousness of a novel insignificance.
He had been ordered out of the room by his own house-
keeper, and had meekly obeyed her. His dignity being
so far abused, it would suffer no more if he sat on the
stairs to think it over; so he sat and tried. But through
ail he was oppressed by the memory of that grey-white

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

CHARLWOOD WITH A NUMBER. 1 63

face, with the trembling eyelids, that lay in the little
room behind him. He had put himself in a false posi-
tion, that was clear. And it would never do to part
with Mrs. Page^that would mean a dislocation of the
domestic system beyond the horror of dreams. But what
could be done? He was unaccustomed to difficulties of
this sort Could any astronomical analc^ help htm?
When the outer planet Uranus was observed to be dis-
turbed in its orbit by something still beyond it, that
something was straightway included in the community of
the planets and given its proper place and name in the
Solar System. Perhaps there might be a hint in that
And—really, he was oddly impressed by that white face
with the near-closed eyes. Furthermore, he must no
longer submit to the dictation of his housekeeper; he
must retrieve his dignity and reassert his authority. As
to that he was resolved.

He rose straightway and knocked at the door of the
bedroom. TTie door opened a little way, and Mrs.
Page's face appeared.

"Just come here, if you please, Mrs. Page," said
Mr. Charlwood, with firm authori^; "and shut the door
behind you."

Mrs. Page compUed, fearful and pleading of eye
as ever.

"I cannot waste more time waiting here, Mrs. Page."

"N-no, sir."

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t64 Divots VANITIES.

"TheFefore you will be so good as take cert^ in-
stmdioiis bef(H« I go; instiuctkHis whicfa I must insist
on your cairying out without ddaying ionger here. Now
as to the second spare bednxHn, next your own, I wish
a fire to be lighted there instantly, to air the room."

"Yes, sir — but wcmt you please tell "

"FU teH nobody but yon, His. Page, and I expect
you to see that my orders are obeyed. Next, now, I wish
you to take a note, whidi I will write, to Dr. Greig."

"Y-yes, sir."

"In putsuance of instructions conveyed in that not^
Dr. Greig will send a trained nurse up to the houses
who will stay there, and whom I shall expect you to ac-
commodate suitably. Also he will send iere an invalid
canine, with attendants, which you must meet, and see
vithout fail that your mother is placed in it with every
care. You understand — with every care."

"My mother, sir? O Mr, Chariwood, you — don't —
don't mean "

"I mean, Mis. Page, that you are not to have the
leave you applied for, to attend to your mother. I re-
fuse it, utterly. I require your attendance at my house,
and in order that you shall have no excuse for leaving
it, your mother is to occupy the room which I have re-
quested you to have aired at once. That is all, Mts.
Page, except that I shall be glad of pen and ink, if I
am to write the note to Dr. Greig,"

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CHARLWOOD WITH A NUMBER. 165

"0 Mr. Charlwood — Mr. Chailwood, I shall pray for
you night and day!"

"I shall need it — I shall need it, Mrs, Page, if my
claret is to be frozen and boiled alternately, and the wrong
soap put in the bath-room, while you are r unning about
visiting your mother!"

"And oh, sir, after what she said, too "

"Said? What she said? She never spoke to me,
Mrs. Page, as you must know. And as to anything she
may have said to you, do you suppose I should listen,
or should remember it if I heard it? Really, Mrs. Page
— really, you — ah — now where is that pen and ink?"

That day the Chailwood system was worse disturbed
than ever, and every orbit was irregular. No stellar
system can endure the sudden introduction of two new
planets and a frequent comet — Dr. Greig was surpris-
ingly like a comet — without some temporary disturbance
of its arrangements. So that Mr. Charlwood found the
observatory a welcome refuge from the turmoil, and went
there early. He went there early, looked up, and saw
a QiarveL

For there in the heavens stood and twinkled a new
star — a star where no star had been before. Truly in-
deed it was a new star — one of those stars that open
out suddenly in the vastness above and there remain to
puzzle the learned,

D,mi,.=flt„Goo<ilc

l66 DIVERS VANITIES.

If I were an astronomer like Mr. Charlwood I would
offer you some theory of these new stars: as it is, I can
only tell you the facU of this, Mr. Charlwood's one
scientific discovery.

Of course other astronomers saw the star too, that
night, and carefully noted its exact position; but it was
Mr, Charlwood who got his letter into the newspapers
first— he took a cab to all the offices and himself
dropped a report at each — and so they called the star
alter him. It was strictly called Charlwood with a
number which I cannot tell you, being no astronomer,
but generally it was Charlwood, simply; and it was Mr.
Chariwood's joy to know that he had not Uved in vain.

Mrs. Page's mother died not very long after her re-
moval, and the nurse went away. And now I believe
even Mr. Charlwood himself has been dead some time;
but his star twinkles steadily in the place where it first
added its tiny Hght to the sparkling sky.

D,mi,.=db, Google

A POOR BARGAIN.

The Indolent traveller might not have guessed the
village in which Daniel Piker lived and considered his
problems — they called it Thorpe Dedham— to be a
place where problems were bred; but if he had had
Piker's brickfield to manage, as well as his little farm
and his chandler's shop, he would have learned better.

They were all little — the village, the brickfield, the
farm, and the chandler's shop; and the indolent
traveller, if he could be got to think about them, might
call Piker's problems little, too. But in the total they
meant a deal to Hker; and their successful little solu-
tions were aiding, slowly but very surely, in the building
up of the little fortune which most assuredly must some
day crown Rker's efforts. Further, there came a day
when to the rest was added the problem of Piker's aunt

Thorpe Dedham was not so very far fi-om London,
when you found it — after much trouble — on the map.
It might have been twenty-five miles, as the crow flies,
or it might even have been a little less; but the quickest
journey between the two, on solid earth, took a lot out
of a day. The nearest r^lway station to Thorpe Dedham

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

1 68 DIVERS VANITIES.

was five miles away, and when you reached it you would
not find it a very useful station. For most of the day
it was shut up; and when a train did stop it was a dis-
couraging train, which puffed and dawdled feebly along
for eight miles at right angles to the direction favoured
by the ciow, till it reached the junction where vou
missed the London train.

So that there was no great flow of traffic between
London and Thorpe Dedham; and any person who had
once performed the journey thought about it a. good
deal before he did it again. The place, in fact, was
just too far from the capital for the suburban trains,
and just too near for those on the main lines. It lay,
moreover, between two of these lines, in a part of the
country which some called deadly dull, and which was,
without a doubt, commercially poor. Nevertheless, by a
strict attention to his little problems, Daniel Piker was
doing very well in his little way. The problem of get-
ting men to work his briddield and farm for lower wages
than was usual he solved with comparative ease, for
work was scarce thereabout; and the problem of making
them return those wages at his chandler's shop, buying
articles of whatever quality he chose to give for what-
ever prices he chose to charge, was not so much more
difficult as you might expect This is a free country,
and a man can always be discharged on the legal
notice, though such extreme measures can be made un'

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

A POOR BARGAIN. 1 69

necessary hj a little foresight; for it needs no more than
to be a bit easy with your credit for a week or two,
and you get your man so far in debt that, with a little
management, he never quite gets out again. And you
can always keep him tame by threatening to stop his
tick — a thing you have a perfect right to do in a free
country.

If Piker's business had been transferred to America,
and multiplied by about a million, it would have been
called a Trust As it was, its figures stopped a long
nay short of millions and even thousands, and IHker
was too busy making it pay to bother about calling it
anything in particular. His litde prefects were generally
accomplished in good and paying terms; and ncme had
involved actual defeat except that of getting the local
doctor to pay a commission on his receipts lirom Pikra's
men and their families. As to that, he never forgave
the doctor. It wouldn't have been much, and whatever
it was might easily have been added to the bills. Clearly
the doctor was no man of business.

And now arose the question of Piker's atmL She
was dying, and the problem, of course, was to make it
pay. Piker's atmt Sarah shared the common lot of
aunts; being suspected, by her relations, of hidden
wealth — cloudy, indefinite, speculative wealth, but wealth
undoubtedly. She was the widow of a small tradesman
in London, and she lived in lodgings in Wandsworth.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

170 DIVERS VANITIES,

In Piker's family wealth was counted, as I hare
hinted, not in thousands, but in hundreds; and wheu
Rker labelled his aunt with her probable figure — in hk
mind he labelled everybody with a probable figure — he
never ventured beyond the higher hundreds, for he had
a rather superstitious dread of expecting too much.

The problem of making Aunt Sarah pay was ex-
acerbated by a grand-niece of hers, a shop-girl in
London, who had the advantage of being nearer the
prey. It was because of this danger that Piker ventured
the extravagance of two journeys to London, paying a
return fare of four- and- sixpence each time. On the
first of these journeys he found his aunt looking exceed-
ingly pale, and feeling very bad, so that he returned
quite happy, being especially encouraged by his aunt's
complaints that her grand-niece was neglecting her.
For it seemed that the thoughtless girl failed to come
and tend her relation, spite of having nearly an hour to
herself every night from the shop only a few miles oS,
at Peckham.

Piker expressed a proper and moral reprobation of
such sinful callousness, and went away a good deal
happier about his four-and-sixpence. A man of forty
whose habits incline him to take a vast deal of trouble
to gain a shilling does not gladly let slip four of them,
and a sixpence over, except upon a clear probability of
consequent profit

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

A POOR BARGAIN. 1 ^ I

The second visit was more eventful. The old
woman was very bad indeed now, and the doctor gave
so little hope that Piker grew very hopefuL He was a
most portentous doctor, who, if he rarely cured his
patients, never failed to impress them.

Piker met him on the stairs, and in reply to his in-
quiries tlie doctor said —

"Ha, bum, humi This is not a case in which I can
conscientiously give you any reasonable expectation of
your aunt's recovery — hum! When we have pernicious
anaemia in a person of your aunt's age, and when we
also have concurrently an enlargement of the lymphatic
glands of obscure causation — hum — then we have not
far to look for the end. Hum! About a fortnight, I
should say. Hum I"

Hker, therefore, greeted his dear aunt with very
great affection. She lay extraordinarily pale and languid,
and talked feebly and peevishly. She was angrier than
ever with her grand-niece, whom it seemed she now
suspected of more affection for "the fellers" than for her
invalid aunt; and, withal, she had grown suddenly senti-
mental on the subject of her birthplace.

"I'd 'a' liked to 'a' seen Thorpe Dedham again 'fore
I went," die said. "But it ain't to be. I 'eard the
doctor talkin' to you outside. *E said a fortnight I
'eard 'im. But it won't be as long. That Pm sure of."

Piker sfud something quite dutiful, though not entirely

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

172 DIVERS VANITIES.

true, about hoping it would be a great deal longer; but
the old woman's thin face shook in an emphatic n^ative.

"No, no," she said, "it won't People as bad as me
knows well enough. 1 shan't last much more'n a week,
Dan, an' p'raps I shan't see you again. I want you to
promise to do something when Pm gone."

Piker was ready to promise anything — a promise
was perfectly safe.

"I want to be put away in the churchyard at Thorpe
Dedham. I've made a will for you to do it What
money I've got is to go to you, if you'll have me buried
decent at Thorpe Dedhanu That's all the conditions.
You'll do that, won't you?"

Piker promised, with something perilously like joyful
alacrity.

"There ain't so much as there was," the old woman
went on, "but I don't owe nothing out o* what there is.
Feel under the pillow."

Piker did so, and presently drew forth a grubby,
dog-biscuit-coloured savings-bank book and a little can-
vas bag.

"All right; put the bag back," Aunt Sarah said.
"That's a pound or two loose just to pay for things.
Look in the book. It ought to be jist over a 'undred
and twenty now."

It was one hundred and twenty pounds fifteen shil-
lings, in exact figures. Piker experienced mingled feel-

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

A POOR BARGAIN. I 73

ings — some gratification, for this was certainly an amount
worth having; and some disappointment, for it was very
low in the hundreds indeed. He resolved to do the
funeral at the cheapest possible figure.

"The will you'll find all right," Aunt Sarah con-
claded. 'Tit see about that It's what I said — all to
you, provided you bury me at Thorpe Dedham, near
mother. An' now I'm tired; an' I think I can sleep a
little. Good-bye, Dan, my boy, an' God bless ye,"

Well, it seemed certain that there was to be a fair
profit out of Aunt Sarah, after all, if not a vast one.
Piker saw the landlady before he left, and intrusted her
with six penny stamps. One was to be used to com-
municate with him as soon as it was clear that the old
lady could last no more than twenty-four hours. But if
the break-up came suddenly, then the landlady was
authorised and empowered to squander the whole six on

Piker was most friendly and gracious with the land-
lady, but he did not mean to leave her alone with Aunt
Sarah's possessions if he could help it Also there was
the grand-niece to bear in mind.

Piker b^an his joum^ home in a rather happy

frame of mind, but he finished it in perplexity and alarm.

As a prudent man of business he dropped in at the

t„Coo<ilc

174 DIVERS VANITIES,

undertaker's on the way to the railway station, to ascer-
tain the very lowest, deny-down, rock-bottom cut price
for a plain coffin and laying oat, delivered complete
with corpse enclosed, free on rail at St Pancras.

The result made him very uncomfortable. At first
he received the estimates with aiiy derision, explaining
that he didn't want gold lining and nails jewelled in four
holes, but soon it grew plain that the thing really was
going to run into money; and then his facetiousness
turned to positive gloom. Moreover, not an undertaker
of them all would even consider his proposal to give
the corpse's old clothes in whole or part payment, but
themselves grew derisive— even indignant — at the sug-
gestion.

At first he had even indulged the hope that an
undertaker might exist from whom actual cash pioSt
might be derived in the matter of those old clothes,
over and above the cost of the coffin, seeing that the
coffin itself might be of any quaUty or none; but now it
grew clear that, on the contrary, the cofRn was going
to cost a good deal more than it seemed to be WOTth.
Piker fell to calculating prime costs with such results
that he set aside for future consideration the idea of
adding a little undertaking trade to the brickfield, the
farm, and the chandler's shop.

As if the undertaker's estimates were not suflidently
alarming, another blow awaited Piker at the railway

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

A POOR BARGAIN. I75

station. He had assumed that a corpse, properly packed
in a coffin, would travel at goods rates; but an inquiry
elicited the sta^ering information that the carriage would
come to thirty-three shillings!

The thing seemed so absurd that Piker ventured to
reprove the officiaJ for his obvious ignorance of the
company's regulations, since he, Piker, alive and well,
could travel the distance for exactly one-twelfth of the
sum, with a liability on the company in case of accident,
which, for obvious reasons, they need not fear in the
case of a corpse. But all for naught; for the impatient
ofRcial, thrusting his finger into the midst of a great
printed column of charges and regulations, withdrew to
his work, and left the dismayed Piker to face the in-
dubitable, printed, exorbitant black-and-white fact that
the unblushing charge for the conveyance of a corpse
waiS truly and actually a shilUng a mile.

Poor Piker entered the train a gloomy and soured
legatee; and he reached Thorpe Dedham at last to find
occasion for more sourness and increased gloom. For
he there ascertained that though the burial fees for a
person dying in the parish were moderate, those for an
imported corpse were a very different matter. Alto-
gether it would seem that Aunt Sarah was bent on
dying with every circumstance of wicked extravagance.
It was a cruel thing that the brutal undertaker, the

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

176 DIVERS VANITIES.

bloated and callous railway company, and now the very
parson and cfaurch wardens, should thus conspire to op-
press the bereaved. Daniel Piker was wrung to Ihe heart

He poured out his griefs before his wife, but got
no sympathy of practical value. Mrs. Piker was not a
woman of intellect, and Piker had married her because
it came cheaper than keeping a servant Still, it is a
hard thing if a man's wife cannot lighten his aSUctions;
and Piker realised it sadly now, when the rapacity of
his fellow-men grieved his soul.

But light was coming — light in the depths of Piker's
darkness. In the midst of his gloomy cogitations there
came an idea — a flash of inspiration. Like all great
ideas, it seemed so simple that he marvelled it had not
come sooner. Why not bring Aunt Sarah aUve? Her
fare as a corpse would be thirty-three shillings; as a
hving person, two and ninepence — a dear saving of one
pound ten and threepence to begin with. Even allow-
ing three shillings for a cab to the station, the saving
would be one pound seven and threepence. Then she
would die in Thorpe Dedham parish, and down would
come the burial fees to a mere fraction. And again,
those ravening harpies the London undertakers would
be bilked completely. And the carpenter at Thorpe
Dedham could do a very nice coffin to set off against
his bill for groceries, 01 should have his credit stopped
forthwith.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

A POOR BARGAIN. 1 77

Nothing troubled I^ker but his unaccountable slow-
ness in perceiving this brilliant way out of his difficulties.
At any rate, no more time should be lost, for now his
sole fear was lest it might be found wholly impossible
to move the old lady. So he sent off a letter by the
evening post, and prepared to follow it in the morning.
This was the letter: —

"My dear Aunt, — It grieved me much to see you
so low to-day, and I been thinking particular about your
wanting to see Thorpe Dedham once more. Dear aunt
leave it all to me and I will come to-morrow first train,
and I have no doubt the change will restore you to
health as it leaves me at present The best cab in
London is not too good for you, dear aunt, and money
will never be no object to me when you are consumed.
So no more as it leaves me at present hoping to see you
first rate to-morrow, — Your affectnt nephew,

"Daniel."

This letter, read to her by the landlady, at first
prostrated and then amazingly inspirited Aunt Sarah;
SO tmich so that although she began by protesting it
would be instant death if she moved, when Piker arrived
he was astonished — one would not say disconcerted — ■
to find her sitting up in a mummy-like roll of shawls

Pivm fami/ia. 13

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

178 DIVERS VANITIES.

and blankets, wherein she had been endued, under her
own imperative orders, by the landlady.

The cab may not have been the best in London, but
it was good enough; and the invalid's transfer to the
train was effected with no greater disorder than Kker's
inevitable dispute with the cabman. But the journey,
as a whole, was rather too much for the old lady, and
she collapsed alanningly ere the train reached its desti-
nation.

Piker's spring-cart was wfuting, however, and the day
was fine; Aunt Sarah, a helpless bundle, was hoisted in-
to the bottom of the cart, and there propped and wedged
among sacks, shawls, and pillows, limp and silent

But a mile or two of jolting so far roused her that
presently she asked faintly; "Dan! Is that the old Blue
Lion I can see the roof of, just in front?"

"Yes," Piker answered, a little surprised; "that's the
Blue Lion right enough."

"An" do they still 'ave Bingham's Old Stingo there?"

"Why, yes, I b'lieve so."

"Pull up, Dan! I'll 'ave a pint 0' Bingham's Old
Stingo if I die in this 'ere cart for it!"

Now there is no end to this little story. For it is
within a fortnight of two years ago since his Aunt Sarah
came to stay with Piker at Thorpe Dedham, and he
now faces the appalling fact that at this moment she is

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

k POOR BARGAIN. 1 79

the very healthiest and toughest old lady in that very
healthy village.

Whether it was the mere change of air and diet
that did it, the escape from the London doctor, the
return to her native surroundings, Bingham's Old Stingo,
or something of all four together, are problems with
which I^er is only vaguely ooncemed; for the solid
problem which never leaves his mind is: what oo earth
is he to do?

The will is still in his favour, with the old proviso;
but he calculates that his aunt's visit has cost him very
nearly the value of the legacy already. Yet if he does
anything which may offend the old lady — let alone
turning her out—that legacy will go at once, of course,
and the whole transaction will stand a dead loss.

On the other hand. Aunt Sarah has a most enormous
appetite, and may live for twenty years. The problem
is one requiring thought, and Piker gives it so much
that it is only at rare intervals that he has time to re-
member, with an added pang, that the Wandsworth
landlady never returned those six stamps.

i,.=db, Google

STATEMENT OF EDWARD CHALONER.

At the time of your visit to this institution, I
promised you, sir, that I would write a simple statement
of my case, and you on your part promised to read it
attentively, with a view to supplementing your judgment
upon my state of mind. I fear that I cannot be certain
that it will reach you, since one of the chief toiments
of my horrible position is, that anything I propose, <K
any wish I may express, is met with a sootiiing verbal
compliance, which means nothing in practice, and is
merely designed to keep me quiet I make no doubt
that such procedure is humane and poHtic in the cases
of the unfortunate people about me, but to myseli^ a
sane man (are there no words by which I can convince
my fellow-creatures of this fact?) it is so great an ag-
gravation of my torture that I sometimes fear that it
alone will drive me into that state of lunacy of which I
am wrongly accused. For it places me as a man is
placed in a nightmare, who sees objects which recede
everywhere from his touch, so t^t he seems to be cut
off and insulated wholly from the universe about him by
some impalpable (and yet how fearfully palpable !) vapour

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

STATEMENT OF EDWARD CHALONER. l8l

or atmosphere; something that yields eveiywhere, but is
none the less impenetrable. But I rely on your promise
to read my statement, and in the last resort on your
friendship with Dr. Wilsey, which may induce you to
ask for the paper if merely as a matter of curiosity.
And if the fact may be, sir, that you have read so far
purdy from such motives of idle curiosity, I do now
most earnestly implore you to give me better attention
for the rest; for I do assure you that for me more
depends on it than man may express: a matter far
beyond a mere affair of life and death, as you will
presently understand.

It is one of the worst torments of a man in my
position that the more frequently and the more earnestly
he protests his sanity the less attention he receives. His
very protestations are taken merely as so many additional
proofs of the supposed disease of his mind, and the
desperate vehemence of his appeals is regarded as
evidence of the severity of his affliction. So that I shall
endeavour to refrain from such protestations and appeals,
so far as the natural impulses of a wronged man may
be controlled. But I will ask you to search your recol-
lection with care, and find, if you can, one single
evidence of insanity in my part of the long conversation
we had together a few days back. Indeed, you virtually
admitted, at the time, that you could detect nothing of
the sort. But I know well enough what is said — what

l82 DIVERS VANITIES.

was told you, I have no doubt, out of my hearing. It
is said tliat I am afAicted wilh monomania; that I am
sane enough in all matters but one — that of my own
identity. I am held to be some unknown person who
has taken the name of Edward Chaloner. But that is
my name, my own given name, and the name I was
bom to bear. I have been dispossessed, thrust out of
the very life my Maker gave me, by a devilry which I
cannot explain, nor even comprehend; and a creature,
a thing, a somethii^, is walking the earth free, in my
place and with my name.

Sir, I offer a challenge. I offer a challmge to any
living man — to you I proffer the challenge rather as an
entreaty. The name and history of Edward Chaloner
are easily enough to be ascertained — his birthplace and
day, the names of his parents and relations, the particu-
lars of his early life. Let these be ascertained by any-
body, and let me be questioned — cross-examined. If I
fail to answer accurately even to the smallest particular,
I will protest and struggle no more; I will sink back
silent into the hell I hve in to wait for the release of
death; unless it be — and this is my fearfiillest thought
— that by the operation of the horrid bedevilment that
encompasses me, I am to be denied this last blessing,
the simple human blessing of death.

I have made the challenge before; I have poured
out the story of my early Ufe — dates, names, everything

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

STATEMENT OF EDWARD CHALONER. 183

— in the ears of anybody who would Hsten; but all to
no effect My words are speculated upon curiously, as
prompted perhaps by a madman's cunning, perhaps by
delusion fed by chance knowledge in days of sanity,
perhaps by some unusual freak of telepathic cerebration;
always from the fixed and immovable assumption that I
am mad. But I beg — I demand-— that Ihe matter be
tested; tested with the last and most minute severity
that human ingenuity may attain.

My name, as I have said, is Edward Chaloner. My
early life was passed in the comfort of a moderate
prosperity, and this continued till some little while after
my marriage. But then, with a young wife dependent
on me, and the future of a family to provide for, I fell
upon such a series of misfortunes as left me penniless.
It is needless for my purpose to detail those misfortunes
here, but please note that I am ready, dispossessed as
I am of all papers and memoranda, to give so dose and
accurate an account of those misfortunes as alone should
establish the identic I claim.

It was in these circumstances that I first became
fully aware of the fact that the civiHsed part of the
world, with all its high pretensions and illusory ideals,
is the mere creature and slave of money, by, with, and
for which the life that is called civilised is conducted.
I need not argue the question with a man of intelligence
like yourself, whose sole doubt will be that I could have

184 DIVERS VAKITIES.

lived so long without observing the fact; the truth being
that my easy life had given me little occasion to remark
it. I discovered, now, that I and my little family were
wholly friendless; and, being so forcibly taught that a
man's only true friend is the money iu his pocket, I
resolved to devote myself utterly to the making of money,
until such time as I could once again face the world on
even terms.

I have heard it said that a man will gain the esteem
of the world by the possession of money, no matter by
what methods it may be accumulated, so long as his
operations do not bring him into gaol. But I think the
exception is ill-reasoned, for I beiieve that the thieves
who go to prison are not despised for their imprison-
ment, nor for their thievery, but for the beggarly sums
they derive from it; and I am convinced that if a burglar
could steal (and kee^ half a million of money at the
cost of five years' penal servitude, he would be greatly
respected and sought after on his release. But notwith-
standing these views — or rather because of them — in
my money-making I resolved to be scrupulous; scru-
pulous, that is, to the degree of doing nothing for which
the law might get a hold of me; and I kept my resolve
with great care.

With this sole restriction I gave myself wholly to
the getting of money, and I succeeded. You must not
suppose me a man of a naturally avaricious tempera-

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

STATEB4ENT OF EDWARD CHALONER. 185

ment My wife and cay children were more to me than
myself, ajid for their s^e I went through years of work
which, for the time, may have seemed to change my
very nature. I went into the d^ with no money, and
I drew my prizes from them that speculate and invest.
At first I acted on behalf of another, handling work
"which he did not wish to be seen to touch, and then,
since he could not help it — for I knew awkward things
— I became his partner. We "played the game," as
the expression went, and we did it at great profit
There were times when my wife remonstrated, on some
fancied point of honour, so that I lost temper at her
ingratitude; and to some extent we became estranged.
But I let it stand, for I had no time then for the family
affections, as she might have understood. I saved all
for the day when I should be able to quit my money-
making and turn again at last to the wife and children
for whose sake I had gone through it all.

Fettle called me hard names, but they were the
losers in the game; in general, of course, I was vastly
respected, for 1 had money, and was making more. In
time it came to pass that even my partner abused me
bitterly, for indeed, seeing my opportunity, I "played the
game" on him, and won. He was inconsistent and
illc^cal, and we separated. And here again, my wife,
who had been quieter of late, gave me foolish re-
proaches, and I struck her. I repented the act as soon

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

1 86 DIVERS VANITIES.

as it was done, and I resolved that I would treat hex
all the more handsomely when this servitude of mon^-
getting was over, and all was made right, as it should
be. For her part, I believe she forgave me readily in
her mind, but I had an appointihent and could not wait
to make inquiries.

Unhampered by a timid partner, I was still more
successful, and soon the time arrived when I could
contemplate a near release from all my labours and
stru^Ies. In six crowded years I had made a fortune,
and I had managed so well that in all the time, though
many hard things were said, I never once had to face
as much as an action for recovery. I set myself to
look about for a house in some beautiful part of the
country, where I could go with my wife and children,
and where we could renew together that happy family
life which had been interrupted by my years of fight
for the means of their well-being. An excellent house
offered, far from London, — a full eight hours' journey,
indeed, — a circumstance which I counted a gain, since
I designed a total change in my way of life. 1 bought
the property.

House and grounds were admirable, and such
alterations and repairs as were needed I set going at
once. Twice or thrice I travelled down from London
to see that my wishes were being properly carried out,
and to give orders as to the placing of the new fiimiture.

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STATEMENT OF EDWARD CHALOHER. 1 87

For I designed no mere removal, but a beginning afresh
of my life where my misfortunes had interrupted it,
with no single reminder of the years that had inter-
vened. My children were young still, and indeed my
wife was young also, though the few years had aged her
strangely. But all should be made well, I was resolved,
in the future; any neglect, any unkindness that had
marked those six years should be atoned a hundredfold.

I broke up my London establishment, and sent my
family to the seaside for the short period remaining till
the new house should be ready; and in the dty I
busied myself in winding up my affairs. This was
readily done in the main, for I had cx>ntemplated my
retirement for some Httle time; but one matter detained
me longer than I had expected, though the profit was
large. It was a matter that could not have been car-
ried through as I did it at any earlier period, for it
would have made me so many enemies in the ci^ that
I could not have continued business. But, now that my
money-getting was coming to a close, I could well afford
to do it, and laugh at them all, for I took care that the
transaction left me clear beyond the finger-tips of the
law; and so I ended my commercial career with a stroke
of high profit.

This matter, as I have said, kept me longer than I
had expected, and meantime I had arranged that my
fanuly should go direct to my new house to await me.

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1 88 Div

But once the afTair was closed, and my last investments
safely made, I lost not a second; but caught the ex-
press that very night, so that my new life of joy and
ease might begin on the morrow.

Of late I had found myself subject to distressing
headaches and fits of faintness, the result, doubtless, of
too prolonged and unremitting application to business.
Perhaps, m view of these ailments, I should have avoided
night travelUng in a sleeping-saloon, but my eagerness,
my longing to find myself once again in the midst of
life as I had known it before my business days, over-
came aU. 1 engaged both berths of a sleeping compart-
ment, in order to travel alone and undisturbed.

My sleep, such as I had, was a very fuiy of night-
mare. Once or twice I half awoke, and I was then
conscious that amid all the roar and oscillation of the
carriage my head was aching worse than I had ever
known. It was positively ringmg with fui agony that,
lulled as it might be by increasing slumber, was then
only exchanged for demoniac sweating dreams. So I
lay while there grew upon me a shaking fear that for
long I could not interpret; till at last I found myself
floundering from my couch and staring through the dim
light at the berth opposite.

There, on the couch that I had last seen Sat and
empty, lay a muffled figure, with its back turned; and
my horror, the fear that was now a choking anguish,

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

STATEMENT OF EDWAHD CHALONER. tBq

was lest the face should turn toward me and the eyes
look into mine.

I flung myself back in my berth, and plunged head
and shoulders beneath the coverlet So I lay till my
nerves calmed somewhat, and I reflected that no doubt
after all this was merely some passenger strayed into
the wrong compartment In awhile, though the roar
and rattle of the train made my brain throb beyond
bearing, I became suffidentiy easy to resolve to rise and
inibrm the guard. I got up, therefore, and looked
again; but now I could see that the berth was Rat and
empty as ever,

I decided to attempt no more sleep, but to dress
and wash ready to leave the train immediately on its
arrival. This I did, but, having done so, 1 fell straight-
way into so deep a lethargy that I remember no more
tin the guard woke me at my destination.

Wearied and faint, 1 left the carriage, and directed
that the single bag that was all my luggage should be
sent on by cart This settled, I ordered breakfast at
the hotel, and made an effort to eat

I suffered from a faintness and a lassitude of a char-
acter novel and strange in my experience. My attempts
to eat succeeded only in sickening me, and at last I
ordered a cab. I had no vehicle of my own to meet
me, for as yet I had bought no horses. That was to
make one of the early interests of my new life.

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1 90 DIVERS VANITIES.

The bright fields and the clear air so far cheered
and freshened me that I stopped the cab a mile out of
the town and went the remaining mile and a half on
foot, gathering a new vigour with every step. I saw my
new life b^^innii^ before my eyes, and I planned its
beginning to the letter. "My dear wife," I would say,
"the bad years are gone and forgotten, and you will
forgive me for whatever I may have done that has dis-
pleased you, for indeed it was all for your sake — yours
and your children's. For your sake and theirs I changed
my nature, but now I am renewed, and come to you,
your husband of old." And I would take her in my
arms, and my children would climb my knees once
again.

So I came to the house at last, and made my way
through a side gate, for that was my nearest eutrance.
I went by a way of yew hedges toward the house front,
and presently, as I turned into a path screened only by
a larch, I saw my wife walking on the lawn, and my
three little ones playing about her. With a full heart,
with my hands extended before me, I went toward her,
calling her by name.

To my amazement she turned, and, with her chil-
dren at her side, began to walk toward the house. I
mended my pace, and called to the children. My chil-
dren ran from me terrified, pulling my wife with them
by her skirt!

. u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

STATEMENT OF EDWARD CHALONER. I9I

"MuridI" I cried, "what is this? Do you turn
from me now? Now, when the reward is ours at
last?"

She caught the youngest child in her anas, and a
man came running from the end of the terrace, with
another at his heels. They were men of my own employ,
men I had engaged when last I was there. Yet now
they stood before me, unrecognising and insolent, de-
manding to know my business.

"Muriel!" I cried again. "Muriel, I have been ill,
but am I so much changed? Surely the children must
know me?"

And as I said the words there came from the house
before me — will you believe the horror? — there came
from the house before me the figure of myselfl A
creature, ghost or devil, in the shape and guise of my-
self; and my children ran to it and clung about its
knees! They clung about its knees, catting it father,
and complaining of the strange man who bad frightened
them I

I stood like a man of stone, and the soul within me
shrank and shuddered; for the eyes of this horror were
upon me — my own eyes, pitiless and exultant, that
searched my spirit through

What more? Nothing I saw but the eyes, nothing
I heard but the names of my children, screamed in a
voice I could scarce have guessed my own. I felt no-

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192 OIVEItS VANITIES.

thing of the struggle, nothing of being carried Scom the
place.

And now that I have written it, can I wonder if
even you think me mad? What can I think myself?
Is there no test, no unfailing touchstone provided by a
merdfiil God, whereby a man may prove his saniqr?
Or is the boon withheld because the punishment of hell
is a thing of this life after all?

D,mi,.=db,Gooiilc

LOST TOMMY JEPPS.

L
A GUARDIAN angel — no, a legion of them — watches
the London railway stations on Bank HoUday mornings.
Nobody can doubt it who has seen Stratford Main
station at such a time. For there are about half a
dozen platforms, with stairs and an underground passage
to join them; and all these platforms, as well as the
stairs and the passage and the booking-offices, are packed
so closely with exdted people that there seems to be no
room for even a single walking-stick more. The fortunate
persons in front stick to the edge of the platform some-
how by their heels, in defiance of natural laws. When a
train arrives, the people in the booking-ofiRce rush at
the passage, the people in the passage rush at the stairs,
the people on the stairs rush at the platform, and nothing
seems left for the people on the platform but slaughter
and destruction, beginning with the equDibrists at the
edge. And yet nobody gets killed. Half the people
are on the wrong platforms, but are wholly unable to
struggle through to the right ones; and I believe the
other half aie on the wrong platforms too, but dim't
""" •""""'"■ ..,..'lGoo;ilc

194 DIVERS VANITIES.

know it And yet everybody gets somewhere, even-
tually.

It is an experience that would test any man's philo-
sophy, and the general good temper is such that, without
a doubt, the place is a resort of philosophers of all
ages.

There was an August Bank Holiday on which Strat-
ford station was as full of philosophers as ever, and not
the least, though one of the smallest of these philosophers
was Tommy Jepps. He made one of a family party,
and the Jepps family party was one of I won't guess
how many such in the crowd, and in many respects like
most of the others. There was Thomas Jepps the elder
himself, head of the family by courtesy, but now strug-
gling patiently at its tail, carrying the baby always, and
sometimes also carrying Bobby, aged four. There was
Mrs. Jepps, warm and short of temper; there were Aunt
Susan, rather stout, and Cousin Jane, rather thin; and
there was Cousin Jane's sister's young man's aunt,
warmer than 'Tilda Jepps and stouter than Aunt Susan,
and perpetually losing something, or losing herself, or
getting into original difficulties in the crowd. And then,
beside the baby and Bobby, there were Tommy and
Polly, whose ages were nine and seven respectively,
though it was PoJly who tyrannised. It was the way of
this small woman to rate her bigger brother in imitatioii
of her mother's manner; Tommy remaining moodily iE-

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LOST TOMMY JEPPS, 1 95

different to the scolding of both, so long as he judged
himself beyond the radius of his mother's arm.

"What 'a' you bin an' done with the tickets now?"
demanded Mrs. Jepps of her husband, in the midst of
the wrestle in the booking-office.

"Me?" asked Jepps, innocently, from behind the
baby's frills, "Me? I — I dunno. Ain't you got 'em?"

"Yes," piped Tommy, partly visible beneath the
capacious lunch-bag of Cousin Jane's sister's yomig man's
aunt, whose shorter name was Mrs. Lunn. "Yes, mother's
got 'em!"

"You look after your little brother an' don't go con-
tradictin' me!" snapped Mrs. Jepps. "Of course I ain't
got 'em," she went on to Jepps. "You've bin an' lost
'em, that's what you've done!"

"Don't contradict mother," Polly echoed, prag-
matically, to her wicked brother. "You be a good boy
an' look after Bobby. That's what you've got to do.
Ain't it, mother?"

"Oh, don't worrit me!" answered the distracted
parent "Where's them tickets? Did he give 'em to
you, Aunt Susan?"

Aunt Susan hadn't seen them, and passed the ques-
tion on to Cousin Jaue. Cousin Jane, with a reproachiiil
look at the unhappy Jepps, declared that he had never
given them to her, whatever he might say or fancy; and
her sister's young man's aunt gasped and stared and

196 DIVERS VANITIES.

swayed ia the crowd, and disclaimed all knowledge of
the tickets; also she announced that whatever had be-
come of them she expected to be taken to Southend,
and that whatever happened she wasn't goii^ to pay
again. Poor Jqjps defended himself weakly, but he was
generally held to have spoiled the day's pleasure at the
beginning. "I think you've got 'em, really, Tilda," he
protested; "look in your ptirsel"

"Yes," piped Tommy once more, this time from be-
hind Aunt Susan; "I see mother put 'em in her purse!"
Mrs. Jepps's plunge at Tommy was interrupted by
Jepps. "You might look, at least," he pleaded.

"Look?" she retorted, tearing open her bag, and
snatching the purse from within. "Look yourself, if yon
won't believe your own wife I" She spread the purse
wide, and displayed — the tickets; all in a bunch, whole
tickets and halves mixed together. . . .

"He'd better not let me get hold of him," said Mrs.
Jepps a moment later, nodding fiercely at Tommy.
"Aggravatin' little wretch I He'll drive me mad one 0'
these days, that's what hell do!"

With that the family was borne full drive against
the barrier, and struggled and tumbled through the gate,
mingled with stray members of other parties; all to an
accompaniment of sad official confusion in the matter of
what ticket belonged to which. But there was no easy
rallying in the subway. The crowd pressed on, and

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LOST TOMMY JEtTS, 1 97

presently Mrs. Lunn got into a novel complication by
reason of her umbrella, which she grasped desperatdy
in the middle, somehow diifting away horizontally into
the crowd at her full arm's length; so that in a moment
she was carried helplessly up the first few steps of the
wrong staircase, dinging to her property with might and
main, trailing her lunch-bag behind her, and expostulat-
ing with much clamour. Jepps, with the baby, watched
her impotently; but Tommy, ducking and dodging among
the legs of the crowd, got ahead of her, twisted the
umbrella into a vertical position, and so releasing it,
ducked and dodged back again. Mrs. Lunn was very
angry, and the crowd cither disregarded her scolding
altogether, or laughed at it, so that Tommy, scrambling
back triumphantly through the crush, came very handy
to divert it

"If I was yer mother Vd give you a good sound
bidin', thafs what I'd dol" said Cousin Jane's sister's
young man's aunt

Any philosopher might be pardoned some resent-
ment at this. And when his mother, having with diffi-
culty been convinced that the staircase she insisted on
was another wrong one, and that the one advised by
Tommy was right, forthwith promised him one for him-
self when she got him home, he grew wholly embittered,
while his sister Polly openly triumphed over him. And
so, with a few more struggles and family separations

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198 DIVERS VANITIES.

(Mrs. Lunn being lost and recovered twice), the party at
length found itself opposite an open third-dass carriage
door, and climbed in with all the speed it mi^t

"Ah, well!" said Aunt Susan, "here we are at last,
an' no more bother till we get to Southend any'ow."

"There '11 be a lot if you try to get there in this
train, mum," observed a cynical coster, on whose toes
Aunt Susan's weight had left an abiding itnpres^on.

"What?" exclaimed Cousin Jane; "this is Ihe
Southend train, ain't it?"

"No, mum," replied the coster calmly, "it aint"

Mrs. Jepps caught at the door, but it was too late.
The train was gathering speed, and in a few seconds it
was out of the station. "There," said Mrs. Jepps, des-
perately, "I knew it was the wrong platform!"

"Then you was wrong again, mum," pursued the
sardonic coster; "cos it was the right 'un. But this
'cre's the wrong train all right"

"Mother!" squeaked Polly, viciously, "Tommy says
— go away, I wiil tell — Tommy says he knew it was the
wrong train when we got in!"

"What! You young you didn't! How did you

know?"

"Read it on the board," said Tommy, sulkily.
"Board in front of the engine. C, O, L, Col, C, H, E,
S, T, chest, E "

"Take him away, somebody!" yelped Mrs. Jepps.

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LOST TOMMy JEPPS. 1 99

"Take the little imp out o' my sight or I'll kill him— I
know I shall ! Knew it was the wrong train, an' let us
get in! I Oh!"

"Why," pleaded Tommy, in doleful bewildeiment,
"when I told you about the tickets you said I was
drivin' you mad, an' when I told you about the platform
you said you'd whop me when you got me home, an'
now 'cos I didnt tell you about the train "

"He's a saucy young varmint, that's what Ae is,"
intemipted Mrs. Lunn, whose misfortunes were telling
on her temper and reddening her face. "Lucky for
him he ain't a child o' mine, that's all! I'd show

"So would I!" added Cousin Jane.

"He's a perfect noosance to bring out," said Aunt
Susan; "thafs what he is!"

"You're a naughty, wicked boy, Tommy I" said his
superior little sister.

Tommy's spirits sank to the lowest depths of dejec-
tion. There was no understanding these grown-up
people, and no pleasing them. They were all at him,
except his father, and even he seemed sadly grieved, in
his mild fashion.

The cynical coster had been chuckling in a quiet,
asthmatic way, rather as though some small animal was
strutting in his chesL Now he spoke again. "It's all
rigltt, mum," he said. "Don't be rough on the kid.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

You can change at Shenfield, jest as good as if you come
in the right train all the way."

This was better, and the spirits of the par^ rose
accordingly; though their relief was qualified by a feel-
ing of undignified stultification.

"Givin' us all a fright for nothing," said Aunt Susan,
with an acid glare at the unhappy Tommy; "it's a pity
some children ain't taught to keep their mouths shut!"

"Why, so I did, an' mother said she'd——"

"Be quiet nowl" interrupted Mrs. Jepps. "Be quiet!
You've done quite enough mischief with your clatter!
Catch me bringing you out again on a holiday, that's all!"

"Ah! he should go to Southend, he should, if he
was my child!" sighed Mrs. Lunn, bitterly. "Not n:iuch
he shouldn't," she added on consideration, lest the sar-
casm were misunderstood.

Ordinarily, Jepps would have received at least half
of Tommy's afflictions; but it is low to wig your husband
in public On the other hand children must be corrected
on the spot, if only to show how carefiilly you are bring-
ing them up; and so for the rest of the journey Tommy
remained in the nethermost deeps of despondency; never
exhibiting the smallest sign of rising to Ihe surface with-
out being instantly shoved under again by a reproof
from somebody.

The cynical coster got out at Romford, with fuiother
asthmatic chuckle and an undi^ised wink at Tommy.

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

LOST TOMUV JEPPS. 201

The train jogged along through Harold Wood and Brent-
wood to Shenfield Junt^on, and there the pai^ found
the Southend train at lasL With the people ab^ady
there they more than filled the compartment they
selected, and Tommy had to stand, a distinction which
cost him some discomfort; for when he stood by the
door he was blamed for interfering wilh Folly's and
Bobby's enjoyment of the landscape, and when he moved
up the carriage his efforts to maintain his equilibrium
led to complications with Aunt Susan's corns.

"Is the door properly fastened?" asked a lady with
a red bonnet and a brilliant squint, of Mrs. Jepps. "I
shouldn't like to see the pore little dears tumble out an'
smash theirselvcs to bits."

Tommy shook with apprehension, for he had no
doubt that, if anything were found wrong with the door,
the blame, and plen^ of it, would fall on him. But
fortunately the fastening was secure; so the lady with
the squint went on; "I 'ope you'U excuse my mentioning
it, but there, I am that frightened with the things you
hear, you cant think. There was one Uttle boy, only
the other day, now!"

"Did he fall out of a train, mum? " asked Mrs. Jepps.

"No, not exactly, mum, but very much the same.
He was stole — stole by a dark short man with black
whiskers an' a scar on his leg, — or else it was the little
boy which had the scar on his leg, though I'm sure it

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303 DIVERS VANITIES.

was the man that had the black whiskers, though ban'
that took aback at the doos I couldn't swear for certain,
though it's a terrible thing for his mother an* father,
whether they was black or ginger."

"Ah, indeed, that it must bel Tommy! What do I
always tell you about lookin' ahti Bobby in the street?
'Spose he was to be took away? It ought to be a lesson
to you to mind what you're told, an' not be such a
wicked, disobedient boyl"

"Oh, that ain't the only one, either," the cross-eyed
woman went on, volubly. "There was quite an intimate
friend of a sister o' mine — leastways my sister knew a
young woman that had a aunt lodging only a few streets
off of her — that lost her little boy too, some munse ago,
just the same way, an' ain't ever seen him again."

"Dear, dear, now! An' took away, just the same?"

"Took away by a dark tall man with a black patch
over his eye an' springside boots. Not to mention a
little gal in the very next street to my own next-door
neighbour's sister-in-law, as was stole not a fortm't after."

"Stole by another dark man?" asked the horrified
Jepps, his eyes protruding with fatherly emotion,

"Stole by a dark woman with a black shawl an' hat,
an' an umbrella with a bone monkey on the 'andle."

Everybody was deeply impressed, and the singular
uniformity in complexion of childstealers as a class, as
well as their sable preference in personal adoramept,

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LOST TOMMY JEFFS. 203

was accepted as a clause in the scheme of nature.
Tommy alone seemed puzzled, as much by these matters
as by the wonder how such minute particulars of the
vanished malefactors had been obtained. In a less de-
pressed frame of mind he might have put difficult ques-
tions. As it was, he prudently held his tongue, and
regarded the speaker with sullen astonishment

But the lady with the squint went on, tireless. She
had become acquainted, through devious channels, with
so many unparalleled kidnappings, and such a company
of swarthy miscreants passed in guilty array through her
conversation, that Southend was reached with the pro-
cession in full flourish. Through all this experience
Tommy was rigidly restrained from recovering his spirits.
By some moral legerdemain each anecdote was made
the text for a fresh lecture on his own enormities, before
the gathering pile of which he stood confounded; a
villain, he grew miserably (xmvinced, as black as any
swart kidnapper of them all.

The day was bright, and Southend was crowded
everywhere with holiday-makers. Mrs. Jepps ralhed her
party and adjured Tommy. "Now you. Tommy, see if
you can't begin to be'ave yourself, an' take care o' your
little brother an' sister. S'pose a dark man was to come
an' take Ihem away! Then I s'pose you'd wish you'd
been a better boy, when it was too late!"

"I'd make him wish it a quicker way than that!"

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204 DIVERS VANITIES.

said Mrs. Luan spitefully; for her misfortunes rankled
stiU.

As the words left her mouth a horrible squeak roit
her ears, and a long pink "trunk" — one of those paper
tubes which, when blown, extend suddenly to a yard
long and as suddenly retreat into a little curl — shot over
her shoulder into her eye, and was gone again. With a
gasp and a bounce she let go umbrella and lunch-bag
together; and, while a grinning boy went dancing and
trumpeting away in the crowd, a trickle of fragrant liquix
issued from the lunch-bag and wandered across the
pavement Tommy Jepps, startled in the depth of his
gloom, hastily stuffed his fist against his mouth, and
spluttered irrepressibly over the knuckles. For indeed,
in his present state of exasperation. Tommy had Uttle
sympathy for the misfortunes of so very distant a rela-
tion as Cousin Jane's sister's young man's aunt

Tommy's father was mildly horrified, and murmured
deprecatingly from among the baby's frills. "Tommy!"
he said, in an awe-struck whisper. "Tommy! Nothing
to laugh at!"

"Get out o' my sight!" cried Mrs. Jepps, making a
miss at Tommy's head with her own bag. "Get out o*
my sight before I "

Tommy got out of it with all possible celerity, and
took his place in the extreme rear of the procession
which formed as soon as the lunch-bag had been re-

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LOST TOMMV JEPPS. 205

covered and cleared of broken glass. And so the pro-
cession, with a score of others like it, went straggling
along the High Street toward the beach, where the crowd
was thicker than ever.

There were large open spaces, with shows, and
swings, and roundabouts, and stalls, and cocoa-nut shies,
and among these the Jepps column wound its way, clos-
ing up and stopping here, and tailing out lengthily there.
It stopped for a moment before a shooting-gallery, and
then lengthened in the direction of a band of niggers;
opposite the niggers it closed up once more, and Mrs.
Jepps looked about to survey her forces. There was
Jepps, perspiring freely under the burden of the baby,
for the day was growing hot; there were Aunt Susan,
Cousin Jane, and Mrs. Lunn, red and rufHed; there were
Polly and Bobby; but — Mrs. Jepps gave a second glance
round before she would believe it — there was not Tommyl

Mrs. Jepps's chin dropped suddenly, and she began
darting and dodging, looking this way and that among
the crowd. "Tommy!" she cried, "you Tommy!" with
a voice still a little angry, but mainly anxious. "Mercy
on us, where's the child gone?"

Jepps turned back, with blank alarm on so much of
his face as was visible above the baby and its clothes,
and the rest of the party started dodging in the manner
of Mrs. J^ps. But they dodged to no purpose. Their

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

206 DIV

calls were drowned in the general hubbub, and iheir
questings to and fro were fruitless: Tommy was lost

"O my child!" cried Mrs. Jepps, "my lovely, darling
boy! What shall I do? He's lost! He's been stole!
The best child as ever was!"

"Such a little dear!" said Cousin Jane.

"Such a jooi of a duck!" said Aunt Susan, affected
almost to tears.

"Oh, oh!" gasped Mrs, Jepps, with signs of flopping
and fainting; "an' — ^an' — you called him a noosance!"

"An' you called him an imp!" retorted Aunt Susan.
"You should ha' treated him better when you had him!"

"If he was a child o' mine," said Mrs. Lunn senten-
tiously, "I'd ha' been a little more patient with him!"

"Patient?" cried Mrs. Jepps, stung past all peril of
fainting. "Why, mum, you had the face to call him a
saucy young varmint, before my very eyes, mum! Before
you smashed your gin-bottle, mum!"

But with that Jepps intervened for peace. "Dont
let's have no words, 'Tilda," he said, meekly agitated-
"You all pitched into him, more or less, o' course, but
the question now is "

"Pitched into him!" ejaculated Mrs. Jepps, turning
on her husband. "Well, an' if we did it was your fault,
I s'pose! First you put me out about the tickets, an'
then you took us into a train that the deEU' child hisself
could see was wrong, an' now — an.' now of course you

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

LOST TOMMV JKTS, 20?

try to put it all on me! It's you as ought to ha' been
pitched into, not him, the love! It's 'ateltil to heat you
talk, Thomas Jepps!"

"Shamefiil!" said Cousin Jane.

"Shockin'i" said Aunt Susan.

"Unmanly an' disgraceful!" said Cousin Jane's sister's
young man's aunt

Jepps blinked and quailed. "But — but" — he splut-
tered feebly — "I — I — I on'y — don't let's have no words!
Try an' find himj an' "

"Oh yes!" sobbed Mrs. Jepps, now verging on tears.
"That's the ofT-hand way he treats me! After aggravatin'
me to death all the morning, an' then going an' losing
my own darling child — letting him get stole — he tells me
to go an' find him! Oh dear! Just like a man!"

"So it is!" assented Cousin Jane. "Always con-
trairy!"

"'Orrid!" said Aunt Susan.

But poor Jepps was off to the nearest stall to ask
the stall-keeper if he had seen a boy. It seemed that
the stall-keeper had seen a good many boys that morn-
ing. But had he seen Jepps's own boy? This conundrum
the stall-keeper gave up without hesitation. But Jepps
persevered. Had tiie stall-keeper seen any dark party
with a boy — the sort of dark party as might have stole
him? To which the stall-keeper made luminous reply
that the darkest parties he had seen that morning wer^

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2o8 DIVERS VANITIES.

the nigger minstrels a little way off; and that was all he
knew about it

Jepps's example did somethin^^ and presently tiie
whole party scatto^d for the hunt Jepps was left with
the baby in his arms, and the other two children about
his knees, and he had strict orders not to lose any of
them, nor to wander from a certain indicated point, near
which the rest of the party might find him on occasioa
He was not allowed to join in the search, because some-
body must take care of the children, and Mrs. Jepps fdt
that she would die of suspense if she were condemned
to wait inactive.

Mrs. Jepps was anything but inactive, and the other
ladies were as busy as Mrs. Jepps. Before they separated
they seized on a wandering apple-woman, who was con-
fused and badgered into a cloudy admission that she
had seen a boy with a dark man somewhere, a little
while ago, or perhaps rather before that; and, her re-
plies being considered evasive, she was instantly suspected
of complicity. Indeed, a very short discussion of her
information enabled the ladies to convince each other
that it amounted to an unmistakable confession, and
made it plain that the plan to be followed was to hunt
dark men, with small boys or without them.

The plan was put in action with too much vigour lo
last The ladies made out in divers directions among
the fifty or sixty thousand people about them, and dis-

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LOST TOMMY JEPPS. 209

covered several dark men. In the upshot the scheme
of the hunt was modified on the urgent suggestion of
the inspector in chaige at the police-station, in the
presence of a. sunburnt and plaintlul donkey-man, an
elderly mulatto, three clamorous organ-grinders, and the
most astonished young Japanese student who ever went
forth from his lodgings to study the hohday customs of
Europe.

So, with other passages of adventure, it came to pass
that Aunt Susan, having rejoined Mrs. Jepps, the two,
fatigued and a trifle hysterical, returned to where they
had left Jepps. As they turned die last comer, a red-
headed man, with his hat in his hand, came running
past them, and vanished in the crowd; while they almost
immediately perceived Jepps in the near distance, striv-
ing his utmost to raise a gallop, while Polly and Bobby
hung to his coat-Uuls, and the baby tumbled and sb-uggled
in his arms.

"Stop him!" cried Jepps, choking with the breath-
lessness of his trot and the flapping of the baby's cape
over his mouth. "Stop him! It's him! He's stole
my "

"The villain!" cried Mrs. Jepps, turning and charging
the crowd. "Stop him! He's stole my child!"

"Stop him!" gasped Jepps again. "He snatched
my "

But Mrs. Jepps and Aunt Susan were deep in the

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2IO DIVERS VANITIES.

crowd, chasing and grabbing, this time, at red-headed
men. Red'headed men, however, were scarce in that
particulai comer just at the moment, and the scarcest
of all was the red-headed man they wanted.

Jepps, gasping still, came up with his wife and Aunt
Susan in the midst of a knot of people, answering the
inquiries of curious sympathisers as he came along.

"Was it a good 'un?" asked another famDy man,
with another baby in his arms, just as Jepps reached his
wife.

"Yes," answered Jepps, "a real good 'unl"

"The best in the worldl" sobbed Mrs. Jepps.

"I won it in a raffle," Jepps added.

••What?" cried Aunt Susan. "A raffle? What do
you meanP Is this a time for sich jokes, Thomas?"

"Jokes?" bleated poor Jepps. "It ain't no jokel
He stole my watdi, I tell you! Snatched it while I was
a-trying to keep baby quiet!"

"Your watdi!" Mrs. Jepps exclaimed; "your watch!
Thomas Jepps, you ain't fit to be trusted neither with a
watch nor a child, you ainti"

Tommy Jepps, meanwhile, accepted his misfortune
with far greater equanimity than did his bereaved family.

He had lagged behind a little at the rifle-gallety, a
place where you shot into a sort of tunnel with a tai^et

t„Coojilc

LOST TOHHY JEPPS, 2 1 1

at the other end. The tunnels — there were four of them
— interested him deeply, and he walked round to the
side of the establishment to see how they were built
They were long, tapering, metal tubes, it seemed, painted
red. Tommy w^ked along to the very aid, hoping to
see something of the tai^et mechanism, but that was
boxed in. Here, at some httle distance from where his
wanderings started, his attention was arrested by a man
in an incipient crowd, who offered to eat a lighted news-
paper for the small subscription of two shillings. It
seemed to Tommy that so handsome an offer must be
dosed with at once, so he pushed into the group, and
stared.

And that was how Tommy Jepps was losL For each
individual member of the crowd agreed with Tommy,
feeling convinced that the others would be sure to sub-
scribe so reasonable a sum without delay, and waiting
so patiently that the subscription was a long time be-
ginning. And when at last it did begin it grew so slowly
that at last the champion fire-swallower of all the coun-
tries he could remember was fain to be content with
eighteenpence, at which very moderate sum his contract
was completed. Having witnessed this feat, Tommy's
eyes retired to their normal places in his head, and his
mouth, which had been wider open than the fire-swal-
lower's, slowly closed. The crowd opened out, and
Tommy, who had been effectually buried in it for half

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212 DIVERS VANTIIKS.

an hour, awoke to the revdatiiin that the rest of his
party was nowhere to be seen.

Few a moment it seemed a rather serious thing.
Then, with a pause of reflection, he saw his misfottune
in another UghL He peered cautiously about him, and,
after a little more consideration, he resolved that he
would not be found — ^just yet, at any rate.

Tommy was not only a philosopher, but a boy of
business. He had come out for a day's pleasure, but he
must attend to business first; as a philosopher and a
strategist he must secure his line of retreat So he
started off back to the railway-station, keeping a wary
eye for his relations as he went

The station was just a little less crowded now,
though it was busy enough still. Tommy had not settled
how, exactly, he should set about his business, but he
kept his eyes open and looked out for a friend. Grown-up
people, his experience taught him, were difficult to diplo-
matise; you never could tell for certain what they would
do or say next, and it was apt to be something un-
pleasant when it came. But there was a sort of grown-up
persons — Tommy could never have described the sort,
neither could he ever mistake it — who were quite ex-
cellent, and always behaved like bricks to boys. And
they were not such a rare sort of people either. So he
set up a watch for some person of this kind, resolved to
ask help and advice. He had not long to wait for one

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

LOST TOMMY JEPPS. 2l3

who, his instinct told him, was a capital spedmen — a
stout, red-faced man in a roaring tweed suit, with a big
gold watch-chain. Several other stout men were with
him, and they were all laughing and chuckling together
at a joke one of them had made half an hour before.

"Please, sir!" said Tommy, craning his neck up at
the red-faced man.

"Eh! Hullo!" said the man, aJmost falling over him.
"Well, young 'un, what's up?"

"Please, sir, will they give me another ticket home,
and who ought I to go and ask for it?"

"Another ticket home? What for? Lost your own?"

"No, sir — mother's got it But I've lost mother."

"O-o-o-oh! Lost your mother, eh? Well, would you
know your way home if you had the ticket?"

"Yes, sir. But" — this with a sudden apprehension
— "but I dont want to go home yet!"

"No? Why not?"

"I come out to have a holiday, sir!"

The red face broadened into a wide grin, and some
of the stout men laughed outright "So you're goin' off
on the spree all by yourself, are you?" said the red-
faced man. "That's pluck. But if you go asking for
another ticket they'll keep you in the office till your
mother comes for you, or take you to the police-station.
That wouldn't be much of a holiday, would it?"

Tommy was plainly dismayed at the idea, and at

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214 DIVERS TANTnES.

his doleliil change of face several stout men laughed
aloud. "Come, Perkins," said cme, "ifs wJy one an' 3.
penny, half single. I'll toss you who pays!"

"Donel" repUcd the red-faced man, "sudden death
— you call;" and he spun a shilling.

"Heads!" called the challenger.

"Tails it is," was the answer. "You pay. What
station, young 'un?"

"Stratford, sir."

"Thafs all right," said the loser, moving off with his
hand in his pocket "I was a bit rash. It might ha'
been Manchester!"

"Thafs saved me precisely one d.," observed the
red-faced man, spinning his shilling again and dexterously
transferring it to Tommy's startled palm. "You go and
buy the town, you desperate young rip! And take care
you don't go losing the last train!"

Tommy was almost more amazed than delighted.
TTiis was magnificent — noble. As soon as he could, he
began to think. It was plain that being lost had its ad-
vantages — very decided advantages. Those stout men
wouldn't have looked at him a second time in ordinary
circumstances, but, because he was lost — behold the
shilling and the railway ticketl Here was a discovery:
nothing less than a new principle in holiday-making for
boys. Get lost, and make your holiday self-supporting.

He did not buy the town, but b<^an modestly with

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LOST TOMMY JEPPS. 2 I 5

a penn'orth of bull's-eyes, to stimulate thought He
sucked them and thought his hardest: thought so hard,
indeed, that in his absence of mind he swallowed a
bull's-eye prematurely, and stood staring, with a pain as
of a red-hot brick passing slowly through his chest, and
an agonised effort to remember if he had heard of
people dying through swallowing bull's-eyes whole. The
pain in the chest presently passed off, however, and he
found himself staring at a woman with a basket of apples
and oranges.

"Apples, three a penny," said the woman entidngly.
"Oranges a ha'penny each. There's nice ripe 'uns, my
dear!"

"I've lost my mother," replied Tommy irrelevantly.

"Lost yer mother!" responded the woman, with much
sympathy. "Why, I wonder if you're the httle boy as
I was asked about? Has yer father got pale whiskers
an' a round 'at, an' a baby, an' yer mother an' three
other ladies, an' yer little brother an' sister?"

Tommy nodded — perhaps rather guiltily.

The woman swui^ her basket on her arm and gave
him an energetic push on the shoulder. "You go straight
along down there, my dear," she said, pointing, "an'
then round to the left, an' yer father's waiting by the
second turning. Dont foi^etl Here — have an apple!"
and she thmst one into his hand. "And an orange,"
she added impulsively, stuiBng one into bis jacket-pocket

t„Coo<ilc ^_

2l6 DIVERS TANlTtES.

TTus was reallf very satisfactory. He had half ex-
pected the apple, but the orange was quite an extra —
had in fact been wrung from the honest apple-woman
by the pathetic look occasioned by the swallowing of the
bull's-eye. Tommy wait <^ in the direction she in-
dicated, but took the wrong way at the first turning
being much occupied with thou^L For he was rcsdr-
ing to look all day as pathetic as could be expected of
a boy with a hoUday all to himself, and a new inveDtiim
to make it pay.

In truth the invention paid very well. Tommy per-
ambulated the crowded beach on a system of scouting
devised for the occasion. He made a halt at each cod-
venient booth or stand, and from behind it carefully
reconnoitred the crowd in front No doubt he was search-
ing anxiously for his sorrowing relations.

Meantime, as I have said, the Invention worked ex-
cellently. He did not always set it in motion by the
crude statement that he had lost his mother; he varied
his gambit, so to speak. Sometimes he asked people if.
they had seen her. In this way he procured a short sea
voyage by interesting the mother of an embarking family
which did not quite fill the boat He had his railway
ticket, he explained, and could get home, but meantime
he must make his holiday as best he might That ex-
cellent family yielded a penny and a bun as well as the

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LOST TOMMV JEPPS. 217

experience in navigation. Just sudi another family was
good for a turn on a roundabout

"Got no change," said the roundabout man, as
roundabout men da For it is their custom, if possible,
to postpone giving change in the hope of their patrons
emerging from the machine too sick and giddy to re-
member it "Got no change. I'll give it you when you
come off."

"Not you," retorted the father of the family, made
cunning by experience. "You'll be too busy, or forget,
or something. Here's a boy what's looking for his
mother; we'll make up the bob with him."

So the morning went; and Tommy, in act of ac-
quiring a high opinion of the generosity of his fellow-
creatures, attained a higher one of his own diplomacy.
Not that it invariably succeeded. At times, indeed, its
failure was total. There was a cocoa-nut shy proprietor,
for instance, whose conduct led Tommy to consider him
a very worthless person. He began by most cordially
inviting Tommy to try his luck — called him a young
sportsman, in fact Tommy was much gratified, and
selected a sdcL

"Money first!" said the man, extending a dirty
palm.

"Lost my motho:," repUed Tommy, confidently, hav-
ing come to regard this form of words as the equivalent
of coin of the realm.

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

3 IS DIVERS VANITIES.

"What?" The man's face expressed furious amaze-
ment

"Lost my mother!" Tommy repeated a httle louder,
surprised to find anybody so dull of comprehension.

'"Ere, get out!" roared the outraged tradesman,
who was not educated to the point of regarding a cocoa-
nut shy a necessity of hfe for a lost boy. "Get out!"
And he snatched the stick with such energy that Tommy
got out with no delay.

He was so far cast down by this ruffian's deplorable
^norance of the rules of the game that his next trans-
action was for cash. He saw a man selling paper
"trunks" of the sort that had so seriously startled Mrs.
Lunn earlier in the morning, and he greatly desired one
for himself. But the trunk merchant was an unpromis-
ing-looking person — looked, in fact, rath« like the cocoa-
nut man's brother. So Tommy paid his penny, and set
out to amuse himselH

TTie toy was quite dehghtful for awhile, and con-
founded and dismayed many respectable persons. But
after a little time it began to pall; partly, perhaps, be-
cause it interfered with business. It is not diplomatic
for any boy wishing to appeal to the pity of a lady cr
gentleman in the character of a lost child, to begin by
blowing a squeaking paper "trunk" into that lady w
gentleman's face. It strikes the wrong note, so to speak.

t,, Google

LOST TOMMV JEPPS. 219

So presently Tommy tired of the "trunk," and devised
a new use for it.

He looked about to find some suitable person to
whom to offer the article for sale, and at length he
fixed on a. comfortable old lady and gentleman who
were sitting on a newspaper spread on the sand, and
eating sandwiches. Now to the superfidal it might seem
that a stout and decorous old couple of about sixty-five
years of age and thirty-two stone total weight, were not
precisely the most likely customers on Southend beach
for such an implement as Tommy had to offer. But
Tommy was less superficial than you might think.

"Please would you like to buy that?" he asked,
looking as interesting and as timid as he could manage.
"Only a ha'penny. It cost a penny."

"Why, bless the child!" cried the old lady; "we
don't want a thing like that I" And the old gentleman
sat speechless, with his mouth full of sandwich.

"I've lost my mother," said Tommy.

For a moment more the old couple continued to
stare, and then the old lady realised the pathos of the
situation in a flash. Tommy suddenly found himself
snatched into a sitting position beside her and kissed.
And the next moment he was being fed with sand-
wiches.

"Poor little chap!" said the nice old lady. "Poor
little chap! Lost his mother and tried to sell his toy

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230 DIVERS VANITIES.

to buy something to eat! Have another sandwich, my
dear."

Tommy did not in the least need the sandwiches,
having been eating almost all day, and being even now
lumpy because of pockets distended by an apple, a paper
of bull's eyes, several biscuits, and a large piece of toffee.
But he wished to be pohte, so he ate as much as he
could, and answered the old lady's questions to the best
of his ability. He told her his name, his age, where he
lived, and what sums he could do. He assured her that
he knew his way home, and had his ticket safe; and he
eased her mind wonderfully by his confidence that he
could find his mother very soon, and particularly be-
cause of his absolute certainty of meeting her, at latest,
at the railway-station. And finally, not without difficulty,
he tore himself away, bearing with him not only the re-
jected "trunk," but added wealth to the amount of
fourpence.

He did very well with the trunk — very well indeed.
He never got quite so much as fourpence again, but he
got some pennies, one twopence, and several halfpennies.
He continued to select his customers with care, and
rarely made a mistake. Some selections were unfor-
tunate and unproductive, however, but that he quite ex-
pected; and it surprised him to find what a number of
benevolent persons, made liberal by a fine Bank Holi-
day, were ready to pay for a thing and then let him

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LOST TOMMY JEPPS. 221

keep it. He never fell into the error of offering his
stock-in-trade to anybody in the least likely to compro-
mise his dignity by using it, for persons of sufficient age
and dignity were easily to be found by a boy of dis-
crimination, even on Southend beach.

But everything must come to an end at last, and so
did the commercial career of the trunk. Having care-
fully observed a large, good-tempered-looking woman sit-
ting under an umbrella, and having convinced himself
that she was not likely to need a paper trunk for per-
sonal entertainment, he proceeded to business in the
usual manner.

"Lost yer mother?" said the woman affably. "All
right, you'll soon find her. Here's yer ha'penny."

And with that this unscrupulous female actually took
the trunk and handed it over to some children who were
playing hard by.

Tommy felt deeply injured. He had no idea those
children were hers. It was shameful, he thought, to take
advantage of a lost boy in such a prompt fashion as
that And he had b^un to feel quite a reviving affec-
tion for that trunk.

But it had paid excellently, on the whole, and, at
anyrate, with his accumulated capital, he could make a
pleasant holiday for the rest of the day: to say nothing
of what might yet accrue from his distressful situation.

So business danced with pleasure through the sunny

t„Coo<ilc —

22 3 DIVERS VANITIES.

hours till Tommy was driven to absolute flight by an ex-
cellent but overzealous old geatleman who desired to
take him to the police-statioD. It was a narrow squeak:
and it was a most fortunate circumstance that the zeal-
ous old gentleman was wholly imable to run. As it was
the adventure decided Tommy to abandon business, and
seek some secluded spot suitable to the pursuit of plea-
sure, unaccompanied and undisturbed.

The clif^ at Southend, as you may know, are laid
out as public gardens, traversed by precipitous paths,
embushed with shrubs, and dotted with convenient seats.
But Tommy did not want a seat In simple fact he was
a little tired of keeping a constant bok-out, and dnce
there were his own party, the apple- woman, whom he
had espied in the distance twice sinc^ their first en-
counter, and the zealous old gentleman, all at large
somewhere in Southend, he judged it safa' to Ue unda
a convenient bush, in scune place commanding an in-
teresting view, and there begin a leisurely picnic.

He found a capital bush, just behind one of the
seats; a thick bush that no eye could penetrate from
the outside, yet from between the twigs of which he had
an excellent view of the sea and some part of the
gardens. It was almost as good as a pirate's cave, and
so very proper to Tommy's situati(m.

He fell to taking imaginary shots at all com^s, with
slight intervals for toffee, till the ramparts of his strong-

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LOST TOMMY JEPPS. 223

hold were piled with invisible copses. Men of all com-
plexiODS fell to bis unerring aim, till at last there came
a red-headed man, walking up the path with a very
laboured air of casual indifference, although he puffed
visibly as he came, as if he had been running; also, as
he walked, he glanced anxiously over his shoulder.
Tommy pulled the trigger of fancy and one more des-
perate foeman bit the dust; after which he sat on the
seat before the stronghold, so that his legs obstructed
Tommy's view.

For a moment Tommy was in doubt how to deal
with so inconvenient an enemy as this, and then he
forgot bis desperate defence altogether; for he was amazed
to see the man's hand come stealing out behind him
into the bush, and there deposit on the ground, absolutely
on Tommy's gun-rest — two watches I

The hand was withdrawn as stealthily as it came,
and the man began, with some difficulty, to whistle a
tune. And now up the same path there came another
man: a tall, well-sel-up man, who wallced like a police-
man; which, indeed, was exactly what he was — a pohce-
man in plain clothes.

"Well, Higgs," said the new-comer suspiciously,
"what's your game to<lay?"

"Game?" whined the red-beaded man m an injured
tone. "Why, no game at all, guv'nor, not to-day. Can't
a bloke come out for a 'olidayP"

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc — ~

224 DIVERS VANITIES.

"Oh, of course," replied the other; "anybody can
come out for a holiday. But there's some as does mm
things on their holidays. I've got my eye on you, my
fine feller!"

"S'elp me, guv'nor, it's all right!" protested the red-
headed man, rising and moving off a little way. "Fm
on'y 'avin' a 'oliday, guv'nor! You can turn me over if
you like!"

Now Tommy did not know that to turn a man over
meant to search him, but he did not stop to wonder.
For what occupied the whole of his attention now, even
to the neglect of the very toffee in his mouth, was the
astounding fact that one of the watches was his own
father's!

There was no mistake about it There were initials
on the silver case— not his father's initials, but those of
a previous owner — and Tommy knew the letters well
enough. Here was news of his father since the rooin-
ing; his watch had been stolen!

In fact, three links of a broken diain were still
hanging to the bow; and Tommy knew the chain as
well as he knew the watch.

Tommy had already approved himself a boy of
business, a philosopher, and a practical person. He
knew nothing of the second watch, whether it was the
red-headed man's or another's; nor did he understand
a word of the conversation he had overheard. But he

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

LOST TOMMY JEPPS. 22^

did know that this watch with the broken chain was his
father's. So, with no more ado, he put it in his trousers
pocket, on top of the bag of bull's-eyes, and then quietly
withdrew from the bush; leaving the red-headed man
and his enemy talking some yards away on the oppo-
site side.

"I can't go home without him!" cried Mrs. Jepps
that evening in the booking-office of Southend station,
"My darling child! I can't! I can't!"

"But come an' ask the station-master," reasoned her
husband. "He might ha' come here to see about gettin'
home. We never thought o' that!"

A small boy, who had been ineffectually trying to
weigh himself by clinging fiercely to the arm of the
machine used for lu^age, let go as he recc^nised the
voices, and came out of the dim comer, calm of de-
meanour and very bunchy about the pockets.

"Hullo, mother!" said Tommy. "I've been waiting
for you a long time!"

Mrs. Jepps really did f^ut at last But it was not
for long. When she came to herself, with water from
the waiting-room water-bottle in her hair and down her
back, she recovered her customary energy with surprising
rapidity. "Tommy, you wicked, ungrateful httle wretch!"
she said, "a nice holiday you've made o' this for me!
Wait till I get you home, that's alll"

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236 DIVERS VANITIES.

"Why, Tommy," said his father. "Wasn't there no
daik party alter all?"

"I don't believe dark parties steal boys at all," said
Tommy. "But ginger parties steal watches! Come!"
he added, with a new importance ic his small voice,
and a rattle of the money in his trousers pockets. "Got
your tickets? Keep close to me, an' III show you the
right train."

D,mi,.=db, Google

OLD ESSEX

D,,. I z=<i„ Google

b,Gooiilc

THE LEGEND OF LAPWATER HALL.

Down the Thames, beyond Hole Haven, there is a
part of Essex now painful to see for any man who knew
it thirty, twenty — even fifteen years ago. For there, late
in the nineteenth century, he saw the gay and simple
Essex of the eighteenth; and now it has been vastly
improved. Little villas of cheap pretension offend the
light of day, and a scum of broken brick has choked
the green fields, lill now they lie dead and dirty, and
scarified with schemed roadways.

But in the days when this was old Essex still, when
the people knew the tales and the songs belonging to
those parts and were not ashamed of them, — it was then
that they told the story of Lapwater Hall,

The house stood a mile or more from Leigh village.
You chmbed Church Hill, rising, as it were, through the
higher tiers of Leigh's tiled roofs, you passed the church
and the rectory wall under the noisy rooks, and you
stood on the brow with the village below you and all
the sunny sea beyond it Hence the way was clear.
With back to the sea you crossed a httle furzy waste,
and went, by stile and path, across three beanfields. As

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230 DIVERS VANITIES.

a fact, of course, the fields grew their crops in due
rotation, but I lilte to remember them as beanfields
fragrant with blossom, where dozy butterflies tumbled,
and where the path rose and dipped, taking you down
among the flowers sometimes, and sometimes lifting you
to see the world and the shining sea.

The third field ended in a gate, and through the
bars you saw the white Loudon road. Here you might
have pitched a stone against the wall of Lapwater Hall,
but for the clump of trees on your left which hid the
house and the pond beside it Leigh House, I believe,
was its older and proper name, but among all natives —
those honest souls, each half-farmer and half-flsheiman,
and now wholly vanished — it was Lapwater Hall and
nothing else. It was not a very lai^ house — Essex
people in old days being given to call any house a hall
that was much bigger than a cottage — but it was well
faced and neat in its proportions, and as good a house
of its size as any thereabout, with a ghost of its own.
The story you heard by parts Irom gossips who had
learned it from their grandmothers; and put together it
went thus: —

At the beginning of the year 17 15 Leigh House
was falling to pieces. Old, neglected, and untenanted
for years, it was scarce worth touching except to pull
down, and there were thrifty souls who had taken to
reckoning when it might become a consdonable act to

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

THE LEGEND OF LAPWATER HALL. 23 1

carry the timber. But early in that same year, when
Essex roads lay in ruts and mud, they found they had
debated too long. For there came news, stirring news
in that time and place. For the first part, Leigh House
and farm was sold; next, and more slining, a stranger
had bought it; last, and most surprising, he had come
on a brown mare, and the mare had no ears.

Whence the stranger came not a soul could tell. He
had been seen riding through Hadleigh, splashed to the
wig with mud, and a little afterward he stopped at
Leigh House, being observed by one Amos Tricker, who
was hedging dose by the road. In those times a man
might have sat by Leigh House a twelvemonth without
seeing a "foreigner" ride by — any absolute stranger
being classed a "foreigner." For this reason Amos
Tricker dropped his sickle and stared hard at the man
and his mare. Of the two the mare was the hand-
somer, spite of her uncanny defect The man seemed
of middle height, but of shape as massive and ugly as
a bulldog, with a coarse face and a squint; but his
animal was fine and brown, hard and handsome, stand-
ing well on good legs. The spectacle of a stranger was
warrant enough for a mighty stare, but that of an ear-
less mare— an unearthly, snaky-headed thing as it was
— was stupefying. Amos was stupefied.

"What's this place?" asked the stranger.

A stranger was surprising, and an earless mare was

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232 DIVERS VANITIES,

worse; but an eu'tess mare cairying a man who didnt
know Leigh House, in sight of which Amos had spent
his hfe, was paralysing. Amos was paralysed.

"What the devil are you staring at? Damme, is
this Leigh House?"

Amos nodded feebly. With that the stranger put
the brown mare easily over the falling paling, and
walked her round the rotten walls of the house. That
done he turned and trotted off Eastwood way without
another word. Amos stared and stared still, till the
apparition was a mile out of sight; then he brought his
eyes slowly back to the hedge, picked up his sickle and
looked at that; and having by this means collected and
concentrated his faculties, he dropped the sickle once
more and trudged oS. For such an occasion as this
there was nothing but confabulation and a mug of beer.

Now the stranger had been seen at Hadleigh village,
as I have said, before he came upon Amos Trickcr.
And the Hadleigh folk, having watched him all through
the street and debated him for the rest of the day,
stood in a fair way to produce between them a far more
imaginatively embellished picture of the phenomenon
than the single slow brain of Amos Tricker could pos-
sibly conceive. And yet, in all their diverse and vary-
ing tales of his broad frame, his long arms, his squint,
his pistols, his brown mare, and his manner of asking
the distance of Leigh House, there was not a word of

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THE LEGEND OF LAPWATER HALL. 233

the mare's lack of ears; and when Amos Tricker spoke
of it he was overwhelmed by numbers. The smith, a
very old and bow-legged man, who sat permanently at
his door while his son worked in the smithy, appealed
to the judgment of Hadleigb as to the likelihood of a
mare with no ears passing his experienced eyes and
leaving him unaware of the deficiency; and the com-
pany supported him with a unanimous vote of ears to
the brown mare. Amos, nevertheless, stood valiantly
and immovably to his own observation, goading the more
downright of his adversaries to something approaching
an affirmation that the brown mare had rather more
ears than usual.

Soon news came to Leigh and thereabout, travelling
from Rochford by way of Eastwood. Mr. Gilbert Crad-
dock had bought Leigh House and farm, and the house
was to be rebuilt, and that in haste; and in truth with
scarce a decent fortnight wherein the news might be
considered, there descended on Leigh House Mr. Gilbert
Craddock himself, with the attorney from Rochford and
a master-builder. Whereupon Amos Tricker triumphed
in the face of all Hadleigh, for Mr. Gilbert Craddock
was the stranger of the debate, and the brown mare he
rode had manifestly no ears.

Then came a great measuring in and staking out,
knocking down and digging up, and in due time, or
rather before it, the plan of the new house was displayed

t„Coo<ilc —

234 DIVERS VANITIES.

to the eyes of the curious in lines of red brick, which
presently grew into ledges and then into walls. By
dmes Mr. Craddock would come and inspect the woil:,
grumbling unceasingly with many oaths. In everything
he found delay and a tridt to cheat a too easy gende-
man; and he said it in language beyond anything the
bricklayers had ever endured from a foreman. They
held it uncommon strong, even for a gentleman.

All this time Leigh learned little of Mr. Gil Crad-
dock beyond his name, and Ldgh gossip fed on specu-
lation. The brown mare with no ears brought its rider
at irr^uiar periods, and the bricklayers were ever in
danger of a chance visitation. Where Mr. Craddock
went in the intervals was a mystery; even the attoraq'
had no notion, or said he had none. When Mr. Crad-
dock stayed at Leigh it was at the Smack Inn, where
he would stable his mare and walk across the fields to
his new house; and when he walked it could be seen
that he was bow-legged from much riding. He would
never talk; surly reserve and a violent exaction of re-
spect were his personal habits; guess and invention were
all the gossips could use. It was largely believed that
he was a secret Government official, coming into these
quiet parts to serve some ruthless design of the gangers,
the natural foes of half Leigh. It was ascertained, in-
deed, that the brown mare's name was Meg; but why
had she no ears? The best guess Leigh could make

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THE LEGEKD OF LAFWAIER HALL. 235

was that it was some part of a horse taming chaim^ —
something beyond the lunane and honey-cake that no-
body doubted had been already used. For the brown
mare was fond of her master, which seemed an nn-
reasonable thing except by effect of cunning interference.

Now the journeymen who laid brick and rafter at
Leigh House were stout Essex men who loved every
pot for the ale it would hold; and as was the way in
that county, it was provided in their hiring that every
man should have bis two pots a day as part wage.
Wherefore Amos Tricker, cutting hedges no more,
travelled back and forth all day with a great wheel-
barrow-toad of pots, taking soUd pay at both ends, and
some Uquid dis(X)unt on the way: since no man could
ask another to brit^ a barrow-load of fiill pots across
three lumpy fields without a spiU.

But although each man's lawful due was no more
than two pots a day, every man looked for more on oc-
casion. For past memory of any journeyman in Essex
a visit on the work from the owner, the master's own
master, bought an extra pot for each man, or more,
according to the gentleman's genUemanly qualities. But
a pot at least was something near a matter of right;
and since Essex ale is the best of drink, it was common
enough that the gentleman took his own pot with the
rest, and for the short moments of that pot gentle and
simple were good neighbours together. So that when

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

2^6 DIVERS VANITIES.

Mr. Gil Craddock first came, and, having sworn his
hour or two, rode away leaving neither pot nor penny
piece behind him, be was thought to err from forgetflil-
ness and nothing worse; Tot the men bad bad their two
pots, and it is the property of Essex ale to make men
very charitable. Furthermore, it was judged as against
nature that any gentleman so free with his curses should
be sparing with his liquor. But Mr. Gil Craddock came
and vent and came and went again, and it was plain
that he was either illiberal or mighty slow of apprehen-
sion; for which latter failing the men took good care to
give him no excuse in the world.

So it went, thirstily enough, till the walls were of
full height and the last roof-beam was iixed. At that
time, and now, and at al! times since houses first were
made, not in Essex only, but in all places where houses
stand, the fixing of the last roof-beam was, is, and has
been an occasion of much rejoicing; and by all precedeat
and law of the craft now, at any rate, ale was due, and
plenty, and time in which to treat it as ale deserves.
A gentleman might even spread a meal, but that was a
matter of grace, and not to be claimed, like the drink,
in the name of ancient custom that was almost law.

It chanced that as this same last beam was being
set in its place, Mr. Craddock looked on from below,
and when at last it rested fair the men gave a cheer
together, left their places, and gathered about him. But

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THE LEGEND OF LAPWATER HALL. 237

he neither understood their behaviour nor felt delight in
the occasion; he opened his mouth, and was three oaths
on the way to ordering them back to their work, when
he was met by a frank demand for extra beer.

"Mr. Craddock's squint intensified, and his face
swelled in red lumps. His common flow of language
failed him in his extremity, and what words he found
came in broken bursts.

"Beer? . . . Beer? Ye boozy scabs! . . . Ha'n't ye
enough a'ready, and more? . . . Beer? , . . Don't I pay
for it, and for every minute o' time you rob me of —
Swabs! . . . Swillpot dc^! Hounds! Lapping all day!
. . . Lap in the pond, ye dogs! Go to the pond! . .
Lap water, saucy hounds; if more drink ye must have,
lap water, as better dogs do every day! Lap water!"

And with that his faculty of speech returned in full,
and the men shrank under a hurricane of oaths that
sent Amos Tricker's daughter Nan, who was bringing a
message, out of earshot aghast Then Mr. Gil Crad-
dock, with a furious promise to the master-builder that
he would teach him, and his men too, the respect due
to a gentleman, and brea^ the head of the next man
he caught loitering or breathing the name of be^, swung
up in his saddle and was gone.

It was more than defeat for those illustrious drinkers,
the bricklayers and the carpenters. Here was im-
memorial precedent, vested interest, privilege of the craft,

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

23$ DIVERS VANITIES.

set at naught, kicked aside, broken down at a blow.
And for themselves, insult was heaped on injury by the
reference of dry human throats to a pond; insult the
sharper because in fact there was little better resort for
them, siace in andcipatioa of the proper honour to the
last beam every man had ah-eady disposed of his two
pots. The genius who invented strikes was yet to be
bom; wherefore there was nothing for it but to get back
to work with ill-will ^d gnimbhng. And since insult
sticks in a man's mind longer than injury it was the
ignoble suggestion of the pood that was grumbled over
longest

They grumbled and sulked and grumbled over again.
They saw no remedy, though they longed to turn Mr,
Gil Craddock's words upon himself; till in course of
days and grumbles it occurred to some lesser geoius,
not tall enough to invent a strike, to dub the new house
Lapwater Hall.

The word went about the place among the new waDs
and rafters with grins and chuckles.

"He-he! Ha-ha! Lapwatei Hall!"

"Mighty fond o' carlin' names he be, too! Fair's
fair, an' 'ds none but fair other folk take a turn a-cariin'
names tool"

"Ha, ha! Hey? Lapwater Hall!"

"Tells folk to lap water, do he? So 'tis Lapwater
Hall! "Tis a merry word! He-he!"

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THE LEGEND OF LAPWATER HALL. 239

"Hey! A true usable name ta be. Lapwater
Hall! And so folk'll know what to expect!"

"Tis good jocoshious, that! Lapwatei Hall!"

At night the new name went to every ale-house
within five miles, and the next day it radiated from
these; and soon it was generally current, so that by the
time the wainscoting was well in hand scarce a soul
thought of calling the new house anything else. This
was partly, in truth, for a reason of convenience. For
during the years of desolation at Leigh House another
house of that name had arisen in the village at the
hilt-top by the church. The first and true name of
this was the Black House; but clearly Leigh House
was the handsomer name, and since it was fallen out of
use with the older place itself, it was picked up and
put iu service. So that in the confusion between the
old Leigh House that was the new house, and the new
Leigh House that was now the older of the two, some
name of effective distinction was needed, and Lapwater
Hall did admirably.

Lapwater Hall it was then, and the name grew into
daily, commonplace use wholly unknown to Mr. Crad-
dock. For as the works neared their end his affairs
kept him much away, and his visits grew fewer and
shorter, to nobody's sorrow. But when the last streak
of paint bad been laid a fortnight and the builder's men

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

240 I>IVE

were drinking their ale on a pleasanter job a good way
off, Mr. Craddock arrived to take up his residence^

He stamped about the house ia his common mood,
but Nan Tricker had so well swept and tidied, under
the eye of old Mrs. Fidler, who was to keep house, that
he could find no fault for a long while, and so con-
tinued to stamp about till he came on Nan ho^elf
a-lovering over the fence with Tim Ladds of Belfairs.
This gave him the opportunity to drive them both about
their business, after which he took his rest.

It was on the next day that Mr. Gil Craddock
began to grow aware of his unpopularity. The stables
were ready, and he went forth, riding whip in hand, to
fetch the brown mare over from the Smack, taking a
httlc turn about the farm on the way.

Two men were walking down Lost Lane. "They're
into Lapwater Hall, 'twould seem," said one,

Mr. Craddock looked round quickly. The words
had not reached his ear dearly, but he went to the
hedge and stared very hard after the men.

He inspected his fields with much complacency.
Here he swaggered, a country gentleman, with good
house and land of his own, and everything handsome
about him. Who the devil had stacked that rick? That
person should hear about it, and soon.

At the first gate on the way to Leigh he met a small
boy with a basket The boy had no hat, but he tugged

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

TH£ LEGEND OF LAPWATER HALL. 24I

a rag of hair very respectfully as he held back the
gate.

"What's that, boy?" demanded Mr. Craddock, point-
ing at the basket with his whip.

"Treacle and candles, sir, for Lapwater Hall."

Mr. Gil Craddock squinted fiercely at the boy for
twelve seconds, and made him repeat the words. Whereat
he clouted the boy on the head, and stalked on.

In Leigh his reception was not of a piece. Some
pulled off hats, others stared over fences. He strode
into the Smack, and the company, half a dozen fisher-
men, stopped their talk on the instant; some rose, and
some sat stolidly in their places. Among them that sat
was Big Sam Gill, a smuggling, hard-drinking ruffian,
eminent among the ruffians — no scarcities — of Leigh;
who cared for nobody, and would much rather fight the
first man he saw than not Big Sam Gill resumed the
conversation with a raised voice and offensive emphasis.

"Gen'elman 1 He ben't no man, let atone gen'el-
manl Ta ben't no man as tells another to drink out o'
fhoss-pond. 'Tis a swine. An' so they carls it Lap-
water HalU Ha! ha!" Big Sam guffawed in Mr. Gil
Craddock's face.

At the beginning of the speech that gentleman's ill-
sorted eyes had turned ferociously on the group. At its
end, with one stride and a reach, he clutched the big
red ear. that was on the near side of Sam Gill's shaggy

Oivrrt Van«ti*$. 16

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242 DIVERS VANITIES.

head, and drove the head a great thump against the
wall.

Sam was ap in a flash, and hurled himself at his
aggressor, hut was met with a straight smash of the
left, flush in the face, like the kick of a horse. Then,
even while he stixxl and blinked, the butt of Mr. Gil
Craddock's liding-whip beat across his head a dozen
blows; till Big Sam Gill lay heaped on the floor with
broken head enough for three. Mr. Craddock was a
prompt man, whatever else might be said about him.
He snarled across the faces of Big Sam's friends, gave
them a curse between them, with a thump of his whip
on the table that made the pots jump, and stamped ouL

It was a brisk mite to the house for the brown
mare, for she carried an ill-tempered man. In the road
before the house Mr. Craddock saw a waggon, laden
with many pots and pans and a deal of crockery; and
as he turned for the stable-yard, Nan Tricker, bringing
a mug of ale, met him full in the way, and began ex-
planations forthwith.

"Twcre onny for Tim, sir — Tim o' Belfairs. Wag-
goner were canyin' the crocks to Black Ifouse as guessin'
'twere the Leigh House meant, but Tim bringed him

on, knowin' 'twere Lapwater " Nan checked the

word too late.

"Go on, damme! Go on! Lapwater Hall! L^
water Hall ye'll call my house, will ye, ye drabs?" Mr,

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THE LEGEND OF LAPWATER HALL. 343

Craddock snatched the mug, and flung it across the
yard. "Lapwater Hall, eh? It sha'n't have the name
for nothing, damn you all! For water you shall drink,
or nothingl Burn ye, I'll slit the gullet of the man,
woman, or child that drinks aught but water in this
place! I'll let the liquor out of 'em, damme! D'ye
hear?" he roared for all to hear, dancing furiously now
on the lawn before the house; "d'ye hear? If a soul
drinks my liquor, begad, I'll take it back with a carving-
knife!"

And Mr. Gil Craddock bade fair to stick to his re-
solve. He kept the cellar key in his own pocket He
would have no brewing on the premises, and all good
drink he kept for himself, under lock and key. Moodily
he nursed the aSront put upon his house, and magnified
it day by day. Not a rustic could show himself about
the place, on whatsoever innocent errand, but drew
forth Mr. Craddock with a torrent of curses and "Hey!
you want my beer, ye sodden swine, don't ye? And
this here's Lapwater Hall, is it? Hey! Lapwater Hall,
ye call it? Go and lap water then, you ill-got dog,
lap water!"

Poor Mrs. Fidler fell off sadly, from privation of
mild ale. It was a privation to which she was unused,
and again and again she protested secretly to Nan
Tricker it was crae she wouldn't abide. Nevertheless
she stayed in the service, being so far in terror of Mr.
i6*

• u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc ^_

244 DIVERS VANIITES.

Craddock as equally to fear staying and leaidng; while
Amos Tricker fell into a despoodency which only an
Essex fann-hand deprived of beer can ever know.

It needs scarce be said that Mr. Gil Craddock made
DO friends, high or low. No man inhospitable with his
drink conld make friends in South Essex; and so this
man had no friend but bis brown mare, who lapped
watCT with content Even now that he was so well
established in the house Mr. Craddock was away frcan
home as long as not, but for such iir^ular periods that
the household got little rehef by his absence. Still no-
body could guess where he went At times he would
lock himself in a room and drink and sleep two days
together; and the differing opinions of the neighbour-
hood merged into a steady belief that he was the Devil.

And so thmgs went for months till a winter's night
when the moon was ringed and the clouds swarmed
fast across her face. All Rochford Hundred, Fouhiess,
and Canvey lay wetter and marshier than ever; and
iapwater Hall was barred, bolted, and shuttered. l*rs.
Fidler and Nan Tricker sat in the kitchen, sewing httle
bags in which to stuff chips from the gibbet at Hadleigh
Cross: a very useful remedy for ague. Mrs, Fidler's
spirits were low, for a dog had been howling wohiUy
since nightfall, and now a huge winding-sheet was visible
in the candle. But a howling dog must rest sometimes,
and a fresh draught will always cure a winding-sheet.

u,mi,.=flt„ Google

OF LAPWATER HALL. 245

For these reasons the troubles were lessening, when
Nan's ear caught the sound of a horse's feet — feet that
went with a regular break and fall that told a plain tale.
The sound neared, and came in at the stableyard.

"Tis the master," said Nan, "and the mare's lamed."

She began to draw the bolts, and had scarce drawn
the last when the door flew open from a kick, and Mr.
Gil Craddock stood before them, haggard and miry.

"Law, sir I" said the women.

"Shut your mouths," he answered hoarsely. "Tear
that apron and tie this arm."

Then they saw that his right arm hung loose at hts
side, and blood dripped from his fingers to the floor.
Mrs. Fidler, terrified, scissored the sleeve away as he
directed, and wound her torn apron tightly over a
wound by the elbow-joint.

Mr. Craddock took a jug of water and emptied it at
one pull. "Any more lights?" he asked, pointing to
the candle.

"No, sir."

"Dowse it Bolt and bar, and neither stir nor
breathe, or I'll come back and twist your two necks.
Say nothing, whoever comes." And with that he
went out

TTie two women sat in the dark and trembled,
neither daring to speak. They heard him go toward
the fence at the roadside. In a few moments more Ihey

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246 DIVERS VANITIES.

could hear him returning, this time with a quiet and
stealthy step ; and they clung together in a terror. Was
he creeping back to murder them? No, he passed
round by the back.

And now there came the noise of many horses,
pounding through the mire of the road and nearing fast,
till they stopped before the house with tramplings and
shouts.

"House there 1 Hullo, hullo!" The gate slammed,
and they were within the fence.

"Hullo there! Hullo!" And with that there came
a great thumping at the front door. The women sat
and quaked.

Many voices called without "Come on, come on!
Why stand here?" "Maybe they^re seen him." "Get
away ahead!" "Where?" "He's doubled." "Knock
again, or go round. They'll lend us fresh horses."

The thumps on the door began afresh, and some
turned into the stable-yard, shouting. Nan Tricks wept,
biting hard on a thick fold of Mrs. Fidler's gown to
keep back a scream.

In the midst of all the hubbub arose a cry of "Here's
the nagi He's close about!" And then a shower of
blows fell on the door behind which the women coweied.
"Open the door! Open, open! In the King's name!
King's officers!"

Some heavy thing was driven thiice against the doca,

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THE LEGEND OF LAPWA1CR HALL. 247

and then with a fourth blow it crashed in, and Nan
TrickCT and Mrs, Fidler fell together into a comer with
a dismal howl. They were dragged out, limp and hys-
terical, anKxig half a dozen muddy men with steaming
horses, and they wept and gasped unintelligibly.

Then the men took lights and searched high and
low, in the house, the yard, and the outbuildings. For
two of them were officers, and the man they sought they
described as a powerfully-built fellow with a squint —
Cutter Lynch, the highwayman.

So large and so daring had been his work on the
great Essex Road and some others, that he had long
"weighed enough," in the matter of rewards, to make it
worth while to raise a party to run him down. There
was no other way of getting him. He worked alone and
confided in nobody; he never drank while on the game-
and in aQ things he was the most businesslike and
watchful high-tobyman unhanged. The party had had
the luck to flush him near Shenfield, and be had shot
one man dead in the saddle before be got away across
country with a bullet in his own aim. By Ingrave,
EComdon, Laindon and Pitsea they had hunted him, and
the brown mare must have been already well spent, or
they could never have kept within hail of Cutter Lynch,
who knew every dyke and fence. Down in the marshes,
this side of Bemfleet, he had begged them cleverly, and
walked his nag slowly up the hill before their faces,

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248 DIVERS VANITIES.

towaid a farther stretch of the road they had latdy
crossed, leaving them to come out as they got in; and
so they followed the road and came to Lapwater HalL

All that night lanterns flashed about the house and
the land near it In the grey of the morning the brown
mare was seen shivering and whickering piteously by the
pond, and in the pond floated a hat They took one
of those great rakes called cromes, and drf^ed fixMn
under the culvert at the end the staring corpse of Afe.
Gil Craddock.

It was there he must have hidden himself, hanging
on by the broken ragstone dll he fainted ftx>m the drain
of blood and fell; so the officers judged, and so it was
told about. As the day came and the news flew the
Leigh people gathered about the pond and stared and
whispered. Here was a judgment! The man was drowned
in the water he had offered thirsty men when he owed
them ale.

Staring thus, they found another thing floating on
the water and dinging near the edge. They fished it
out and turned it over in amazement, for it was a pair
of horses' ears joined by a strap and fitted with a catch
to hold to the headstall. They wore the false ears that
Brown Meg wore when Mr. Gil Craddock was Cutto-
Lynch, the high-tobymani

There was the end of Mr. Gil Craddock in the body.
A few months afterward, at Nan Tricker's wedding, there

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THE LEGEND OF LAPWATER KALL. 249

was a deal of rgoicing, and whatever was drunk did not
come from a pond. For it was drink of a quality so
good as to give Amos Tricker an idea. He would
descend into the cellars of Lapwater Hall, which stood
teaantless, and would make definite investigation into
the contents. But he got no farther than the cellar steps,
for there, in a glocmiy comer, stood the ghost of Mr. Gil
Craddock, mug in hand, squinting on him and beckon-
ing him to drink his fill of the old ale. And nothing
could be juster or more likely, when it is remembered
what deadly sin the highwayman had to purge, in the
denial of good drink owing his feUow-man; though Amos
would have none of the invitation, but ran till he fell
headlong, and there slept

And of the many witnesses, illustrious drinkers, who
have seen old Gil since that time, it is said that not one
has accepted his offer of drink, and so helped him to
redeem his otherwise unpardonable fault Though it is
not easy to believe Essex men so implacable as that

D,mi,.=db,Gooiilc

THE BLACK BADGER.

ROBOSHOBBRV DovE tukd unstrapped his woodeo 1^
as was his way when he sat in this place to smoke his
pipe and tell me the tales of his youth. He stuck the
p^ into a convenient cleft on the hillside, so that the
socket made a comfortable rest for his elbow, and looked
out from under the brim of his glazed hat at &e seme
that was most familiar and gratefiil to his eye: the scene
wherein he read the news of the outer worid more
readily than he could have done in any newspaper in
Essex. There below lay the vast space of soft and sunny
water where the Thames and the sea were one; at oui
feet the marshes, green like a billiard table, mapped ovct
with the geometric lines of dikes and ditches, and seamed
along the middle with that thin brown line that had
wrought such little change as the countryside had known
since Charles the First: the railway,

Roboshobery Dove was always an old man, in my
memory, though a sturdy old fellow to the last As I
write it is some way short of twenty years since he died,
yet he fought the French in a King's ship as a boy, and
was never tired of saying so. He was an old man, very,

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THE BLACK BADGER. 25 1

when he taught me the cutlass drill and told mc tales
in half-holidays; and he lived to tell me many more
tales in years when I was a schoolboy no longer: tales
of smu^ling on the Essex coast, of fights with Dutch
fishermen in the lowland seas; and of Cunning Muirell,
the witch-finder, he told me all that I have written and
much that I can never write. And now, at the time
when he told me the story that I am to tell again, he
still stumped his way near and far without a totter,
square and upright in his green smock, brown and hard
in his face, and no more than iron-grey in the hair that
curled over his earrings, though he was nearer ninety
than eighty.

"Aye, aye, sir," said the old man, "I often wish I
was young again myself, an' knew all about everything.
I don't remember ever bein' particular new-fashioned,
but I was young once, an' I knowed a deal. I dunno
a quarter so much now." He sucked hard at his pipe,
and his eyes twinkled. But, indeed, I bad done no more
than hint a trifle of doubt as to the value of a curious
charm against rheumatism, long used by a wise woman
of Foulness.

"No," he repeated, "not a quarter. An' I ha'n't
forgot much neither." His glance moved about the great
expanse of air, laud, and water before and below him,
over villages, marshes, hill-slope, and copses, and I fore-
saw a story. For here, spread before us, were the scenes

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as* DIVERS VANITIES.

of a hundred, told and untold, and Roboshobery Dove
was but looking for an excuse or a reminder. Presoitly
be took his pipe from his mouth and pointed. "See
there, sir," he said; "d'ye know the cottage down there
with the roof new-tiled? Black clap-boarded cottage,
onny one floor: just lookin' over that spit o' the hill, on
towards Leigh."

I saw the cottage, but knew it only because I had
seen it before.

"Well, this is the second time Fve seen it new-tiled;
'twere thatch when I were a lad, Twere there as one
o' the things happened, I ha'n't forgot~an' sha'a't, neither.
An' a fine young man — aye, two of 'em — lamed summat
fresh, young as they were; an' that were the end on
'em." The old man slopped, and smoked in alence,
waiting to be asked for the story.

So I said, "What was it they learned?"

"ITiey lamed, sir, they lamed — well you've heard
tell o' Mother Lay, th' oad witch?"

"Didnt she ^ve Cunning Murrell work a long time
ago?"

"Aye, she did, sir — 'fore you were bom or your
father either. He puzzled her once or twice, sarten to
say, when he were a young man, in a comparin' way tf
speakin'. But he den't hev nothen to do with this con-
sam. Why, oad Mother Lay — oad Nanny Lay, as most
called her — she were the badger witch, as you may ha'

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THE BLACK BADGER. 253

heard. You don't chance to ba' heard o' the black
badger, up at the Crown? No, — there arent many alive
to tell ye, an' if they were 'haps they wouldn't, some
oad parties bein' feared* o* raisin' a laugh. But 111 tdl
'ee, an' ye may laugh, if yc like; I can stand it Well,
oad Dave Cloyse kep' the Crown at that time — Sim
Qoyse's elder brother he were, an' dead long enough
ago. Dave Cloyse, he trapped a badger, or somebody
else trapped it for him, an' he putt it in a barr*! in the
yard, for to be drawed. Now there were cur'ous things
about this badger, an' the fust cur'ous thing it were arl
black, every bit Never saw a black badger, did ye?
No, nor nobody else as I know. Well, this badger were
no sooner safe putt in the yard than a chap — Sam
Prentice it was; he were young then, hke me— sets his
dc^ to draw it It were a tough oad dog, an' had
drawed many a badger; an' it were a noisy oad dog.
But this time it rushes in — an' drops dead in the barr*!,
without a sound. Sam, he pulled it out by the hind-
quarters, but 'twere dead enough — bit hard over the neck
an' dropped like you never see a badger do afore. Sam
takes the oad dog round to the pump an' pumps on
him, but twere arl for notheu — neck broke. An' when
he an' Dave gets back to the barri the badger were
gone, dean, in broad daylight! Now, sr, you know well
enough no na^ral badger 'ud leave his bole in open
day, barrin' he were dragged out with main force. An'

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254 DIVERS VANITIES.

mrare, you'd ha' thought somebody 'd 'a' noticed such a
thing as a black badger, in the open street, in bioad
daylight, wouldn't ye? But nobody did. Na But what
they did see — two on 'em — were oad Nanay Lay. Oad
Nanny Lay, in her big bonnet, coming out o" the Crown
yard at a trot! Out o' the Crown yard she came^ an'
up the street, an' away!

"That were the first seen o' the black badger, but
the next time meant more 'n killin' a dog. Now, at the
time I'm tellin' of — 'twere 'fore I lost my leg — two
brothers lived in the cottage down there we were speakin'
of, with their mother. EU Drake an' Robin Drake were
their names, an' they were twins; an' twins an' all as
they were, one was a preventive man — what you'd call
a coastguardsman now — an' t' other a smuggler. That
sound queer in these days, but 'twere all right then, an'
a very convenient uirangement when George Fourth
were king. Why, the revenue cutter Swallow ran a cargo
of its own into Wakcring now an' then — aye, an' more
than now an' thenl Ah, them were great times — plenfy
o' good money an' plenty o' good drink about then!
Well, Eli Drake were a preventive boatman aa the
Leigh station, as I've said, an' his brother Robin were
as desprit a young rip as ever handled the tubs along
this here shore; and we've had some desprit rips, toes
in my Umel The chief officer had been a sleepy oad
chap, doin' nothing but waiting for his sup'rannivation,

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THE BLACK BADGER. 255

ah' lettm' tlie station go as it liked — same as most cf
the preventive officers at tliat time. So Eli an' Robin,
bedmate brothers, gives each other the fair dp when a
cargo's to be run; where the tubs 'II be, an' where the
guard 'II b^ an' all convenient ^i' comfortable; an' the
chief officer, he snores asleep all night, and the guard-
boatmen they pulls off the other way, and the cargo
comes in fair an' easy, and goes inland on the carriers'
backs, or on the pack-horses, comfortable an' straight-
forward as if 'twere crops off a field. As for poor oad
Stagg, the ridin' officer, we den't care a sdck for hint.
Everybody just laughed at poor oad Stagg. O' course,
the preventive men, they den't lose by it; every man had
his little complimentary tub, so to say, just for his own
use, an' here an' there other folks had their little com-
plimentary tub — parson had his reg'lar — an' so every-
body was happy an' agreeable, which were a great deal
better than rows an' disagreements among neighbours,
an' fights on the marshes an' sich.

"So it all went fair an' sofl^ sir, as you may guess,
till the oad oiEcer got his pension and a new 'un came.
He were very busy an' zeaiousy, were this new officer,
an' people got displeased with him. He were out at all
onseasonable times o' night, dodging up an' down the
Ihore, an' dropping unexpected on any boat's crew as
were layin' up quiet for a smoke or a snooze. An' he
went nosing an' sniffing up an' down the place, most

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256 DIVERS VANITIES.

ODndghbourly suspicious, routing about for tubs o' brandy
an' gin, an' trying to make troubles an' misunderstandia's
among folks as were quite agreeable to let things go cm
pleasant an' comfortable, just in the reg'Iar cad way. So
things had to be done a bit more cautious; an' the chaps
took care o' their pistols an' what not when there were
a run, an' young Robin Drake, he swore if the diief
officer run up agin ^tVn when there were a job goia',
he'd get a charge o' lead — an' two if one weren't enough.
Desprit youug rip he were,

"Now, 'fore the new officer came, most o' the stuff
was took in on the straight run — ^just brought direct
inshore an' walked off. But this wouldn't do with the
new officer about j so the next crop was sunk. You see
the Marsh End Sand?"

The tide was out, and the sand lay, a brown streak,
out in the winking blue water two miles from where
we saL

"Well, a shade beyond that there's the Oad Joe, a
sand you onny see at bottom o' spring tides. The tubs
were sunk 'twixt the two, double-anchored, on four drift-
ropes, an' they were to be brote in on two seprit ni^ts,
two boatloads a night So far settled, Eli Drake gives
his brother Robin the straight tip about the guard-boat
orders, an' the first night half the crop's landed neat an'
handy. 'Twere along there they landed 'em, just round
that spit o' the hill, where there's a fair sheltered depth

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THE BLACK BADGER. 257

for a ran id. 'Twere a pretty proper night, no moon,
but not so dark as could be wished — 'tis mighty odd
how one moonless nighf s a. deal lightei'n another. Every-
thing were ready — carriers waitin' handy in a copse on
the hill — an' the two boats pulls in arl they can go,
loaded up. You see we never wasted no time over the
dash in; soft an' cautious in the oiling, if you Uice, but
Mice arl's clear an' you put your nose inshore, bang yoa
go in, whip your tubs onto the canieis, an' shove away
smart; an' the carriers they went off smart too, 'fore any
trouble could come along.

"Well, this time the carriers was lyin' low in the
copse, as I've tdd you. You know the copse — the farthest
out bit o' copsewood anywhere along these parts. 'Umfl'
says one chap, sniffin' hard. "I shouldn't ha' made
count there'd ha' bin a badger-earth this far out by the

'"Umf! Umf!' sniffs his mate, 'I shoon't ha' thote
it, nayth^! Plain enough to smell, though,' says he.

"This were just as the boats were pullin' in, Robin
Drake were in the first boat, an' he jumps out a'most
afore ^e touchy. But afore a soul moves in the copse,
afwe one o' the carriers has time as much as to straighten
his 1^, up jumps oad Nanny Lay in the very midst of
'em! Up she jumps, an' goes a-mincin' an' a-skippiu'
down to the boat, hoppin' an' dandn' with her gown
held wide in her hands. The carriers arl stands fair

Diners y-nilie,. I?

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2$& DIVERS VANITIES.

gastered, knowin' as not a soul but 'emselves had a-laid
down in that copse — a score of 'em, dose as carrots.

" ' Good t' ye arl,' says Mothra' Lay, bobbin' an' caperin',
' Good t' ye arl, if ye*!! remember a poor oad woman, an'
buy good luck with one little tub! One little tub o* the
right Uquor to warm my poor oad belly in my oad age!
An' woundy good luck ^all go with every man o' ye,
an' wither an' blight on the King's men — for one Uttle
tub, such as ye never gave me yet, though passin' my
door run arter nm! One little tub for good luck!' An'
she capers agen, an' jines her thumbs overhead.

"Tlie men were dunted dumb to see her, but Robin
Drake, that feared for nayther man nor devil, he cussed
her and warmined her, an' made to drive her with a
rope's end. 'Get off, ye naggin' oad shanny,' says he;
'an' shut your gab 'fore ye get summut to sing for!'

"But the rest o' the men — older men, mostly — were
a sight less daresome with a witch. 'Shut your mouth,
Rob Drake,' says Stephen Allen, that was pardner in the
venture, under his breath. 'The run's but begun. Dont
risk the ill-tongue on the crop if a tub '11 satisfy her.
See, mother,' says he, 'take a tub an' get scarce with it,
an' keep it out o' sight I' For there were few in these
parts that dared go crossways with oad Mother Lay.

" 'Thank ye, an' good luck. Master Allen,' says the
oad woman, bobbin' like a string-jack an' grabbin' up a
tub. 'An' no thanks an' no luck to them as calls me

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THE BLACK BADGER. 259

in!' An' off she goes, a-hugging the tub afore her, up
to the lane. Tnere a fair heavy load for an oad woman
like her, an' she goes slow enough; but kickin' an' liftin'
her heels like jumpin' Johnson.

"The carriers stood gaipin', but Rob Drake an'
Stephen Allen damns 'em back to their senses, an' gets
the rest o' the tubs on 'em quick enough, an' off they
goes up the hill an' along the lane quiet and safe; an'
so that night's nm came off all right Though there
were one more cur'ous thing. Oad Nanny Leigh couldn't
ha' been more'n forty yards ahead o' the first carrier
when be set off at a trot, but arl the way up an' past
her cottage — a good half-mile — nayther he nor none o*
the others once clapped eyes on her agen; an', true 'tis,
the lane were the onny way for her to gol

"But Rob Dralce were angry to have his word over-
borne, an' called it sin to waste a tub on »ch an' oad
trollops. An' when he told bis brother Eli, EU thought
so too. 'I'll surprise the oad witch,' says Eli Drake,
'an' the tub sha'n't be wasted arter all I'

"So next art'noon, towards dusk, up goes Master
Eh Drake, mighty gay an' knowin', in his King's uniform,
to oad Mother Lay's.

" 'Good evenin' to ye. Mistress Lay,' says he, standin'
in the door an' lookin' round the keepin'-room. ' Tis a
fine day an' looks like good harvest.'

'"Aye, that it do, Masttt Drake,' says the oad

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260 DIVERS VANlTIiS.

voman, lookin' at Eli a bit sideways. For there were
migh^ little furniture in the place, an' she was mindful
that the tub weren't so well hid as't might be. Come
to think of it, it do seem a wonderful odd thing that
most o* the witches I ever heard on were so poor in
clothes an' furniture; looks as though the devil were
slippery in his bargains.

"So Mother Lay she looks sideways at Eli, and Eli
he grins broad an' impudent, an' steps in unasked
"Tis a hainish unpleasant business is mine, mum,' he
says, grinnin' wider 'n ever, an' starin' this way and that
about the place, up an' down, an' all round. "Tis a
hainish business, but it shouldn't make ndghbours bad
friends. That's a good big apron you've throwed undo
the kneadin '-trough, but I seem to see the shape of a
tub o' some sort under it Sure/f not a tub o' while
brandy? No, suiefy not!' An' with that he stoops an'
lays hoad of it; an' oad Nanny Lay she looks at him
hard an' eviL

'"Ah! but 'tis!' says Eli Drake, 'A tub o' moon-
shine, if ever I see one. Sorry to disappoint ye, mum;
but 'tis my duty to seize this here tub.' An' he heaves
it up on his shoulder, grinning an' winking.

"'Take care, Eli Drake,' says oad Mother Lay,
lookin' more evil and dangerous than ever. 'Take caie
how ye cross me I'

"Eli Drake laughs outright at her now, an' for a

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THE BLACK BADGER. 26l

moment the oad woman changed her tune. 'Ah, Master
I>rake,' says she, ' 'tis pleasant of ye to make your joke,
but people might see the tub from the lane. Putt it
down, now, there's a deary, an' we'll hev a glass
together. Come, 'taren't neighbourhke to cany a joke
too far!'

"Eli only walks out with the tub on his shoulder,
laughin' fit to crack. *I count I can cany it about as
far as Leigh,' says he. 'At any rate, don't worry — PU
do my endeavour!'

" 'Now don't 'ee be so hard on a poor lone woman,'
says the oad witch, pleadin' an' beggin'. "Tis ill for a
fine King's officer like you to take away the little drop
o' comfort from a poor oad widder, Master Drake. 'Tis
sarten you don't mean it Master Drake, do 'ee let be!"

"Eli Drake cut her short 'twixt laughin' an' sweaiin'.
'Let go o' my coat,' he says, 'an' take it lucky 'taint in
my convenience to walk you off too!' Because o" course
he never meant carryin' the tub farther than his own

"When she saw nothin' 'ud change him, she let go
all an' cursed. 'I warned 'ee, Eli Drake' she screamed:
'I warned 'ee an' ye wouldn't listen. I begged 'ee an'
ye laughed at me. Listen or laugh, laugh or listen,
you'll rue this minute when 'tis too late! You'll me
this minute on earth above an' in hell fire below! Go
home, go home, Eli Drake; go home laughin' with your

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262 DIVERS VANITIES.

Stolen tub; go home to your bed an' make the most o'
this night's rest, for your next will be a. bitter one!
m putt upon ye heavier an' sooner than yc know—
you an' your twin brother too, that tried to rob me
first!'

"Eli Drake laughed till the tub jiggled on his
shoulder, as he walked down the lane. An' oad Nanny's
voice followed him out o' sight

"'Go on, go on!' she says, 'yow ha'n't far to travel
What I can't do mjrsdf 1 can putt it on others to do!
Make the most o" your time, you an' your brother both!"

"Robin laughed as much as Eli when he heard the
tale, an' they both sat down to stick a gimlet in the tub
and drink luck to the next run. Only their mother
fared uneasy. 'Vou shouldn't ha' done it, Eli,' says
she; ' 'twill lead to trouble, sarten. Take it hack now,
and call it all a joke, do! Take it back, an some other
Uttle thing with it, to pacify herl'

"But the boys only laughed again, an' poured her
out a glass of brandy-an'-water, which she wouldn't take.
She were a little, quiet woman, were Mrs. Drake, far un-
like her sons, though they fared mighty fond of her,
both of 'em. But as for givin' heed to what she said—
not them.

"The two brothers went to bed together merry enough
that night, after they'd unplugged the gimlet-holes more
than once, an' more than twice. Eli was off guard for

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THE BLACK BADGER. 363

the night, and the two slep' sound and heavy. But
their mother was wakeful. Mighty still it is o' quiet
nights down on the marshes, as you know, an' she, lyin'
awake with her window open, for 'twere summer weather,
might ha' heard the grass growin', pretty nigh. She lay
awake and uneasy; an' in the black of the night there
came a sound of something scufHiDg past very quiet
outside. Twere no human thing, surely, an' nothen on
four feet that she could fix on as very likely; not the
dog, for he were chained behind in the yard, nor the
cat, nor a rabbit, for neither scuffled that way. Tis
likely she never thought of a badger.

"She lay an' listened, an' heard the thing go
brusbin' along as far as t' other bedroom window, where
her sons were, an' there it stopped. An' at that the dog
behind woke an' began snifhn' an' whinin' an' shakin'
his chain.

"Barrin' the dog, she heard no more for a good
while, an' then twas somebody walkin' about in her
sons' bedroom. At this she got up an' went out an'
along to their door. Twere not loud footsteps, an' she
guessed it were either Robin or Eli on his bare feet So
she called. The footfalls stopped, but there was no
word of answer. So she called again, an' made to open
the door. Now that door, sir, was just on a common
latch, no more; such as you lift with a finger. The

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264 Div:

latch lifted easy enough, but the doc^ might ha' been
nailed for all it 'ud budge, top, bottom, or side.

"Mrs. Drake thumped an' called. 'Robin!' she
called. 'Eli! Be you sle^walkin'? Why d'ye hold
the door?'

"There came not a sound but the footfalls again.
They went across the room an' stopped; and then the
bed creaked an' bumped, an' all were quiet

"Mrs. Drake made no doubt but that one o' the two
had got up asleep an' putt the chest o" drawers across
the door. So she went back to her room, meanin' to
slip on a shawl an' a pair o' shoes, an' go and look in
at the other bedroom window. She'd scarce got to her
door but something made her change her mind, an' she
ran back to call louder an' push harder. An', behold
you! no sooner was her hand on the latch than the
door opened, free an' easy. The door opened, an' there,
on the casement-sill opposite, was a black shadowy some-
thing that turned tls head, with a long sharp snouL It
turned its head an' then bundled out o' window neck
an' crop, scratchin' down the ivy an' scufBin' off over
the garden; an' the dog outside jumps wild on his chain,
and howls like Bedlam.

"Mrs. Drake was near to drop with flight, but she
ran across an' banged the casement, an' catched it. An'
then she smelt, an' the place was full of what the earners

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THE BLACK BADGER. 265

liad sniffed in the copse the night afoie — the stink of a
badger.

"'Robin! Eli! Wake up! Are ye well, my boj^?'
she called ; an' shook the nearest by the shoulder.

"He was heavy in sleep, an' 'twas a moment or two
'fore he woke enough to grunt an' wonder. He was all
right, 'twould seem, an' so was fother; an' they scarce
said it but they were fast asleep again. They hadn't
tapped the tub for nothing, them jolly twins.

"Their mother was thankful to find 'em unhurt, but
she was frighted an' bemazed at the whole thing. She
could only hope that the thing on the sill had been no
farther; though she was sore troubled an' distressed. So
she dressed herself, an' walked about the rest of the
night, an' sat, an' worried, an' peeped into the young
fellows' bednxHn every now an' then. There was no
more to disturb her, 'cept that at fust, as she began
dressing, she heard a queer sort o' snarling bark two or
three times outside the garden fence. She guessed it to
be a stray dog, or a fox, though the noise were far un-
like either. That was because she den't know the voice
of a badger; few do, for tis a silent beast, mostly.

"In the morning Robin an' Eli rose up dry an' sick
an' surly. Bad heads an' bad mouths they'd both on
'em got Sarten to say they'd had a good few turns at
the brandy tub, but it had never served 'em so before,

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266 DIVERS vANnmg.

such purely good stuff as tnas. They snapped an'
snarled at one another every turn.

"'Paht' saysRobio. 'Eacesmdlslikeasty. Couldnt
'ec leave the window open, same as I set it?'

"'Leave the window open?' says EIL 'I did. Ye
shut it yourself, dajig 'ee.'

"'An' who's a-been at my pistols?' says Robin. 'I
left 'em in the drawer, an' here they're atop o* the chest
Loaded, tool I'd a-swore I drawed the charges yestn-
day. Seems you've been a-sleep-walkin'l'

" 'Sleep-walkin' yourself!' growls EIL 'I ha'nt
touched your pistols. Pity you can't hold a drop (f
Uquor like a man. Ugh!'

"He pufls and spurts with his dry mouth, an' pre-
sently draws out from his lips two stiff black haiis.
'What's this?' he says. 'Mouth like a mortar-mill, hair
an' all. An' on the bed, too; stinkin' black hair, like a
polecat's. What sort o' bnite ha' ye been harboutin' in
here, ye drunken lump?'

"So 'twent till they were nigh at blows, them two
brothers as had never quarrelled in their lives afore.
An' they were as short an' snarly with their mother, too,
an' would Usten to nothing she had to say about the
affairs 0^ the night; till the poor woman went away an'
cried. An' the fear was on her, hard an' heavy an'
black; for she knew that oad Nanny Lay had been vith

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THE BLACK BADGER. . 267

'em in the night, an' these were no more her sons as
she'd known 'em, but men bewitched.

"So the two brothers went about growling an' snap-
ping an' scowling, an' sometimes almost fighting. But
most of the day they kept apart. Now, the night to
come was app'inted for running the rest of the tubs o'
brandy. There had to go a night between, 'cause the
carriers wouldn't work two nights tt^ether; an' they'd be
httle good for smart work if they would, for need of
sleep. Twere Eli's turn for night guard, an' as he were
going out, says Robin: '"Hie rest o' the crop's comin' in
to-night How about dme?'

"'Time yourself!' says Eli, an' swears, 'nme your-
self, an' go about your smugglin' your own way. I'm
a King's man, I am!' An' he slouched off, bladt as
thunder.

"'King's manl' shouts Robin, Til give ye King's
man, ye sulky brute!' An' he'd ha' rushed after Eli to
strike him, but his mother held him back, an' prevented
him. He pushed her away, swore worse than Eli, an'
presently went off on his business. An' his mother sat
at home, an' cried again.

"Well, that night the boats pulled off, an' lifted the
rest o" the CTop o' tubs all fair an' easy, without a. kink,
Twere a good night for the job, moonless an' cloudy,
an' darker than the first night Robin Drake gave Uttle
thought to his blether's talk, knowing well enough the

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26S DIVERS VANITIES.

reg^ rounds o" the preventive boats. TTxe carriers were
^1 in to time, waiting in the copse, just as before. All
being dear, as far as could be guessed, in came the
boats, over the Marsh End Sand, hard as men could
pull. In they came, an' Robin Draie an' Stephen
Allen had a pair o' tubs on the first carrier almost as
soon as they'd touched bottom. The carriers swarmed
round, the boats were half unloaded, and some o" the
men were getting of^ when

"•Bah, there/' comes a roar from the hill-spit be-
hind the copse. 'Stand, every man o' you, in the king's
name!'

"An' Lord! there were the preventive men almost
round 'em a'readyl An' more than the Leigh boatmeo,
too — a lot from a cutter.

"Then there was the biggest fanteeg an' hullabaloo
an' general Dovercourt ever heard along this coast The
new chief officer came tearin' an' swearin' down with his
whinger in his hand, callin' to his men to seize every
man of 'em. One or two o' the carriers hulled down
their tubs an' ran, others ran an' took the tubs with 'em.
Some o' the boatmen, hemmed in, tried to make a bit
of a stand, reckonin' on the preventive men favourin'
'em and giving 'em a chance of a bolt, an' others made
a move to shove off the boats. An' slap in the thick of
it all came a pistol-shot, that made most of 'em jump
where they stood; and then another.

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■OfE BLACK BADGER. 26g

"The two shots were close in the same spot, h
seemed, though there were a. few moments between 'em.
Who had fired nobody knew. The chief officer pro-
mised a deal to the smuggler found with a smoky pistol,
but pretty soon them as could had got away; but most
were took, and most o' the tubs. . . .

"Well, when it came to lookin' over, it was seen that
Eli Drake was missing; an' twas an hour 'fore they
found him. Find him they did at last, however, after
the prisoners had been marched off, an' they found him
by help of a lantern that one or two were using as were
left to search for dropped tubs. An' they found his
brother Robin with him. It was in a little hollow below
the copse, an' there the twin brothers were lying, one a-
top o' the other, dead an' bloody. They turned 'em
over, an' their faces were set like the faces o' two tightin'
dogs.

"Shot they were, both of 'em, Robin through the
bead, an' Eli through the chest, and shot at kissing dis-
tance; for Eli's coat was scorched as big as a crown
piece, an' Robin's temple was black, where any temple
was left But both the fired pistols were Robin's.

"Now, 'twas plain enough that Robin had shot Eli,
but nobody could ever tell which o' the two had shot
Robin. Whether Eli snatched his other pistol in the
struggle, or whether the spell lifted from Robin when he
saw he'd shot his own brother an' he put the second

270 DIVERS VANITIES.

pistol to his own head, nobody ever knew; nor ever will,
not in the world we're sittin' in.

"They carried them along up the lane where oad
Nanny Lay had earned her tub two nights bade, light-
ing thdr way with the lanterns. An', believe me, sir —
or believe the men as saw it, rather — all the way up
there went a black creature before 'em on its hind 1^
bobbin' an' caperin' an' tumin' its head, with a long
sharp snoutl Aye, till they were like to drop the bodies
an' run, very nigh, sir, thou^ there were seven of 'em
together,"

"Shadows from the lanterns, probably," I suggested;
for I was young, and doubtless too pert with my elders.

"No doubt, sir," said Roboshobcry Dove, drily,
"since you say sa But not havin' been there myself I
didnt contradict them as was. However, nobody here-
about saw much more o' Mother Lay."

"Did she die?" I asked.

"That I wont say, sir, but leave it to your opinion.
There was a great noisin' about o' the matter next day,
as you may guess, an' towards late in the afternoon
things grew so that a gang started up from Leigh to
drag oad Nanny Lay out an' swim her, or worse. They
were a woundy rough lot in Leigh at that time, as'
there's no tellin' what they might ha' done if they'd
found her. But she was gone, an' nothing left in the
cottage but what wouldn't go in a bundle or so.

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THE BLACK BADGER. 2J I

"They buried the brothers in the far comer of
Hadleig^ Churchyard — just beyond where I showed you
so many of Cunning Murrell's children were. There the
two lay together, as they'd lain in their cradle, an' in
their bed, an' as they lay at last under the hill, by
the marshes.

"Well, sir, they'd been in two nights when oad Bill
IVentice, the sexton — Sam Prentice's father — comin' into
the churchyard late, saw something. He saw something
dark creepin' by the new grave, ahnost under his feet.
What it was strucic his mind in a flash, an' he chopped
down on it with the edge of his spade, an' chopped
again an' again, mad strong and chokin' with fright; an*
the thing shrieked, sir — shrieked like a woman! An' he
chopped an' chopped an' chopped till he fainted dead
away; an' there they found him, with the Black Badger
lying by, chopped an' mangled an' dead, but plain to
tell for the same badger Dan Cloyse had trapped.

"The grave lay a bit high, with a little bank down
to the fence by the lane, like as you know; an' in the
momin' twas plain to see where the creature had come
from, for there on the side of the bank was new-dug
earth, an' that earth burrowed straight down into the
grave. And in the burrow, sir, in the hole, when they
broke it open an' raked it "

Roboshobery Dove bait across and whispered the
last grisly words of his taJe : words I would rather not write.

u,mi,.=flt„CoO<ilc

THE TORN HEART.
I.

It is a most notorious fact that on Christmas Day
the power of all witchcraft withers to naught; channs
and spells turn to empty sounds; imps and familiars
cease to walk the earth; their evil works are cut short at
the stroke of midnight on Christmas Eve, and resome
no more till the next midnight strikes. Thinking again,
I may be disposed to admit that perhaps the fact is less
notorious now and here than it was in Essex in the first
half of the last century, when Cunning Murrell guarded
that lusty counQ^ against the powers of darkness, and
when the fact I have mentioned was very notorious in-
deed, and so were a hundred other facts of the same sort

There was a Christmas Eve in those times when
winter had begun in a fickle, shifty fashion that sadly
bothered all living things. There had been a frost or
two toward the end of November, and then a spell of
warm weather — really warm weather, that brought out
primroses everywhere, while here and there a monthly
rose, recovering from its late discouragement, struggled
into blossom again; and the birds, aAer a little puzzled

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THE TORK HEART. 273

hesitation, took spring for granted and set to work to
keep abreast of the times. Then in the middle of
December there came another nip of frost, and again
fine weather; so that neither birds nor flowers could
guess what to be at; till at last the matter was settled
by a light fall of snow two days from Christmas, with a
hard frost quick upon it

On the afternoon of that Christmas Eve, Leigh
chorch door stood sometimes shut and sometimes open,
for the church was being decked with holly and bay,
and though the party within were apt to push dose the
door at an incoming draught, still there were goings and
(Xtmings, and there were moments when light was wanted
just within. Standing by the porch under the dial, one
might look out over the tumbled old red roofs of Leigh,
and so across the great estuary of the Hiames, wide and
alver-grey for miles, till one could say no more whether
be were looking on salt sea or on winter sky, except
where a duller line of grey declared the place of the
Kentish hills. Nearer, and to the right, lay the dun
marges; and Cauvey Island stretched beyond them, flat
and dull, like dead weed on the water.

The light began to fail, and all the greys and browns
to draw together in a universal dusk, save here on the
hills and among the roofs below, where Uttle drifts and
setdements of snow hngered in rifls and crannies. Within
the old church it grew wholly dark, and the last few

Divtrt VaniUa. l8

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274 DIVERS VANITIES.

branches were set in place by the light from a dn lantern
which had been provided by the forethought of Abd
Robgent — a forethought which he was at great pains to
expound, now that it had been justified by the event

"Ah!" said Abel sagaciously, a dozen times to every
living soul in the church, "Ahl I knowed it! "Twill be
past blind man's holiday 'fore we're done,' says I, 'an'
I'll hev the lantran.' 'No,' says Tom Bundock, "tarait
needful' But yow dcn't know, Tom, an' I did!"

Abel Robgent's lantern went at last bobbing and
smelling down the aisle, casting random patches of light
now on the tall pews, now on the faces of his com-
panions; anon waking the glints of holly and bay-leaf
over their heads, and at last flinging a ray across the
ancient alms-box by the door, and calling into sight
its sprawled lettering, "i praye vov the pore beuembes."

And so the party found themsdves in the dusk with-
out Far away in the midst of the great blank that was
sky and sea, the Nore light was twinkling, and there
was a light in more than one window down the hillside.
Joanna Bell was of the par^, with others who sang in
the choir — Nat Prentice, in particular, as well as Tom
Bundock and Tilda Coates, and several more. It had
been matter of great interest during the afternoon to
observe that something seemed to have gone awry be-
tween Joanna Bell and Nat Prentice, promised lovers as
they were known to be. For Joanna had been scai to

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THE TORN HEART. 275

turn away, with elaborate and stately care, from any part
of the church in which Nat was busy. It was noticed
also that if Joanna needed help to reach beyond stretch
of her own finger-tips, or to cut a stout branch, it was
to Tom Bundock she turned, and that with a look and
a smil^ as the observers judged, more than adequate to
so casual an occasion. The female observers, that is to
say; for in these matters the men are dull dogs, and it
is doubtful if one among them — except Tom Eundock
himself — were aware of what was matter of great interest
among the girls. Even Nat Prentice, they perceived,
took the thing with surprising coolness; and, indeed, if
the kindness — tenderness, the spiteful might say — of
Tilda Coates could console him, then he had consolation
in plenty.

Was it a break-off, or nothing but a chance tiff?
Some judged the question answered by what they saw
at the churchyard gate. There Joanna lingered a mo-
ment to gaze, as it seemed, across the sea at the Nore
Light; but when Nat Prentice came briskly up the path
toward her she brought herself back quickly enough to
immediate concerns, and turned away with a lift of the
head and a jerk of the shoulder not to be mistaken.

Nat stood for a moment as she sailed off into Chess
Lane, and then took his way down-hill alone: not alone
for long, however, for it was seen that he and "Tilda
Coates turned into the street below together.

18' _^

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276 DIVERS VANITIBS.

Nor did Joanna long walk unattended. She trod
Chess Lane with a valiant smile about her little mouth,
but with a strange, full glint in her eyes. Thirty yards she
had gone along the narrow path, when she turned at a
quick footfall behind her. It was Tom Bundock, made
bold by an afternoon of espedal favour.

"Hal I den't guess yow'd go Chess Lane way,"
grinned Tom Bundock.

"Well, and what then?"

Tom Bundock's grin narrowed, and his eyes widened.
For the girl's voice was nothing less than savage, and
her face made such a contrast with the countenance that
had been so often turned on him that afternoon that
poor Tom, never quick-witted, was reduced to a gape and
a stammer.

"I — I — ^just thote Pd step along homeways with 'ee,"
he said at last

"Then you won't; so go back!"

Torn stood blinking, and she stamped impatiently.
"Go back, I say!" she repeated, "Or, if this is your
way, then go on alone and leave me. Go on — one way
or the other I"

Tom Bundock rubbed his glazed hat back and forth
on his head, and lurched aside with a rudimentary effort
at an independent flourish.

"Ho, ho! Ari right," he said with a glance first
down the lane, then up, and then behind again. "Arl

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IME TORN HEART. 277

right; I'm agoin' fast enough I" And he lurched and
clumped away back toward the church, his hands in his

pockets.

Joanna watched him go, and then resumed her walk.
Chess Lane was a narrow path bordering the edge of
the hills, with the Rectory grounds on one side and the
drop to Leigh and the sea on the other. It is gone
now, — the Rectory garden swallowed it long ago — but
in those times it was a favourite walk, being kept hard
and clean with crushed cockle-shell, and having a bench
or two beneath the overhanging trees. Joanna found it
empty, however, at this time and season, as was to be
expected. She walked another thirty yards, with fire in
her eyes, and no smile; and then she flung down on a
bench and burst into a fit of crying.

It was cruel — it was wicked of Nat to behave so.
Why didn't he come after her, as that fool Tom Bundock
had done? Why didn't he come after her and beg for-
giveness, and make it up? As to what he was to beg
forgiveness for, that was a detail she did not stay to
consider, for she had trouble enough as it was. Nat had
turned his back on her — or at least he had not seemed
to mind when she turned hers on him, which was very
much the same thing. And then that fat, ugly, design-
ing 'Tilda Coates! . . . Here Joanna's passion did in-
justice to Tilda Coates, who, whatever she may have

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278 DIV

had of designs — and of reasonable plumpness — was not
ugly.

As for herself, Joanna, what had she done to merit
all this bitterness? Nothing at all. When she had essayed
to give proof and flavour to her dominion over Nat
Prentice by the natural process — offering him cause for
jealousy — his jealousy had refused to be roused; or at
any rate he would not let it be seen, which was even
more annoying, because perverse. This had been some
days ago, and since then she had gone fiirther — who
could help it? If only he had grown visibly angry it
would have been something, but it would seem that a
pointed slight merely cooled him. Xbus she had driven
him farther and farther from her, and now she could
find no way to bring him back. To-day she had even
gone so far as to prefer that stupid lout Tom Bundock,
and if that would not reach Nat, what could be done
with such a man? Though indeed what she had done
was little more than sheer self-defence, with Tilda Coates
going on so. And poor Joanna's sobs broke out afresh.

She had made almost sure of him, at the church-
yard gate. She had stood looking out over the sea to
give him a chance of coming up with her. Of course,
when he came, she had turned away from him- — that
was the proper thing, after what had occurred; and she
had walked across to Chess Lane, instead of taking her
usual way down Church Hill, so that he might be ob-

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THE TORN HEART. 279

served to foDow humbly after her, full in the public eye.
But he had done nothing of the sort; he had openly and
shamelessly disregarded her, and it was not Nat but
Tom Bundock who had come clumping along the cliff
at her heels. It was wicked and cruel, and so she sat
and cried herself quiet again.

With hei quietness came a little sober thought What
should be doneP What could be done except — yes,
there was an expedient Joanna sat up and wiped her
eyes, and gazed out into the far darkness. All the
weapons in her own annouiy were used and blunted,
but — there was Cunning Murrell.

The cunning man was the comoion refuge of all
whose troubles had grown beyond their management
Joanna's own mother, now lying in the churchyard she
had just left behind her, had been cured of a "sending,"
which involved sores on the leg, by the skill of Murrell.
A cow bewitched or a man or woman "overlooked" —
any such task was easy play to Cunning Murrell, as was
hkewise the cure of agues or fits; and as for charms to
bring back a straying lover— why, Essex was alive with
just such lovers, brought to heel and safely married by
the arts of the wise man. He was not only doctor for
beast and man, but the hammer and scourge of all
witches, and in that matter a needful blessing enough;
for there were witches, and would be, in Leigh for a
hundred years to come; three there would be in Had-

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280 DtVKRS VANITtES.

leigh for ever, and as many as nine in Canewdon. This
thing could not be doubted, for Cunning Uuirell had
said it himself.

The thought brought a flash of light into Joanna's
mind. There was the explanation — the unimpeachable
explanation, Tilda Coates had trafficked with a witch,
and was drawing away Nat Prentice with a love-chann!
Most surely that was the truth, for what other explana-
tion could answer the circumstances?

That was enough. For a witch's work all remedy
lay with Cunning Murrell. Joanna rose, put away her
handkerchief and went on her way at a quicker pace.
At the top of a path leading down the hill she paused
a moment, with a doubt whether or not to go home first
But that mig^t hinder her enterprise, and at any rate
there was the old housekeeper to tend her father if he
needed it So she passed the turning and hurried on
through the Tikle Field, beyond the Rectory grounds,
over the stile, and so out toward I^pwater Hall and the
road to Hadleigh.

Lapwater Hall was a place to be passed after dark
at a run, with the face averted, by one who knew the
tale of the ghost, as Joanna did; but beyond that no
more than brisk walking was needed. The wh<de walk,
first to last, was two miles ; and then, in a clump of
trees, Joanna found the beginning of Hadleigh village,
and Murrell's cottage hard by.

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IHE TORN HEART. 28 1

It was one of a row in the lane to the left that led
down to the Castle and the marshes below it. Joanna's
steps slackened as she neared the little black house, and
soon they stopped; for now she realised that to make a
resolve to consult the cunning man was one thing, and
easy; while to knock boldly at his door and pour her
troubles in his ear was another, and harder. She turned
and shrank into the shadow of a tree that overhung a
fence on the opposite side of the lane.

A light bumed in Munell's keepmg-room, and the
blind of the little window was fringed with the shadows
of the herbs that hung within. It would seem that the
wise man was at home; but to venture into his house
and there to tell that strange old man all the tale of
her baffled coquetry — that seemed a venture beyond
Joanna's courage. She turned her money over in her
pocket, and wondered if it were enough; and she thought
of forcing herself into the business by a rush across the
lane and a thump at the door which would take her
into the middle of things willy-nilly. But no; she could
not do it If only Murrell had been a woman I

As the wish crossed her mind the little door opened,
and there, indeed, a woman stood, with Cunning Murrell
lighting her out The sharp-faced little old man carried
a candle, which he shaded with the disengaged hand;
and by its light Joamia saw the girl on the step, and
knew her face. It was Tilda Coates!

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282 DIVERS VANmES.

MuTrell's client bade him good night and vanished
in the dark of the lane; Muirell himself retreated and
closed the door; and Joanna Bell was left amazed.

Here was Tilda Coates's abettor, then — Cunning
MurrelH Here was the secret spring of the whole trouble
— Tilda Coates had got her charm of Murrell himself;
and now, there could be no doubt, had come up by the
shorter way over the hill-slopes to renew and confirm it
for the dance to-night at Pettles's, at Tarpots Hall.

Murrell's aid, then, was out of the question; it was
enlisted on the side of the enemy. And against Murrell
what could avail?

But perhaps — perhaps. . . . The chaim might be
well enough, but might not Tilda Coates herself be
vulnerable? Joanna grew the more dangerous as she
saw her case the more desperate.

It was no inconsiderable part of Joanna's afHiction
that she could not go to the dance at Tarpots Hall that
night. It was not for lack of invitation, but because Nat
had said that he was going before she had announced
her own decision in the matter. TTiis left her no choice
but to reply that she should stay away. Of course that
only meant that she must be entreated, that Nat should
be submissive and disconsolate, and so forth; thereupon
she would have graciously relented, and all would have

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THE TORN HEART. 283

been well But no — there was no doing anything with
Nat: he would not see it

And it was not to be a common dance in a cleared
bam either, for Tarpots Hall had a fine great parlour.
Indeed, the place had been something more than a mere
farmhouse once, and Mrs. Fettles, the fanner's wife, was
persistent — even heroic — in maintaining the name Tar-
pots Hall intact, in face of a scandalous general tendency'
to shorten it to mere "Tarpots," And at Tarpots Hall
everybody — everybody worth mentioning — would be
dancing to-night, except Joanna Bell. Truly, Joanna's
cup of bitterness was running over.

Back to Logh she went by the way that 'Tilda
Coates had come. It was, indeed, the shorter way,
when one remembered that the wet places on the lower
slopes were now frozen hard. But it was a dark and
broken path, and needed knowledge; also Joanna had
no desire just now for the company of "Tilda Coates,
who was picking her own way no great distance ahead.
So that the shcH'ter jotumey advantaged Joanna very little,
and the clock at the stairfoot struck seven as she lilted
the latch of her father's house in Leigh Strand.

It was a gabled structure of timber and plaster, with
a garden about and behind it, which climbed some part
of the hill-slope. In the keeping-room the old skipper
sat propped among pillows in a chair, with rheumatism
for his main interest in life, and, as a consequence, with

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284 DIVERS VANmE&

little either of abiltty or iuclinalion to interfere in his
daughter's concerns.

This evening be observed nothing unusual in Joaima,
such being the blindness of man and the absOTbency of
rheumatism, and he scarcely troubled even to commoit
on her lateness for tea. He took it for granted thiit
she would leave again in an hour or two for Tarpots
Hall, since — very naturally — she had told him nothing
of her difficulties and misfortunes: troubles which would
have been beyond the old sailor's comprehension. And
when, indeed, she did leave a Uttle before nine, he
thought nothing of the fact that she went straight from
her bedroom to the street, calling her good night from
the front door, beyond a vague guess that she must be
in a hurry, and a lisdess wonder that Nat Prentice had
not called. In line, he had been accustomed all his life
to let the womenkind have their way unquestioned in
the house, just as he had always made sure of his own
way aboard his schooner.

But Joanna's reason for not showing herself to hei
father was simply that even he must have noticed that
she was wearing her ordinary workaday clothes under
her cloak and hood, and might have asked questions
which she would have preferred not to answer. Nevo'-
theless, it was toward Tarpots Hall that she first turned
her steps; but that was mainly because the house was
on the way to another place,

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THE TORN HEART. 285

She went a circuit to avoid observation, leaving the
village by its western end, mounting to the Tikle Field,
and thence skirting Leigh with a wide sweep. So she
came to Taqjots Hall, where it stood on the high ground,
with its lighted windows looking out over the marshes
and toward the sea.

In the east over the sea and the Nore the rising
moon lined the clouds with hazy light; and the snow-
drifts on the hills, the trees skirting the fields inland,
and the bams and fences about the farmhouse, took
form but slowly out of the gloom. Joanna had thought
to skirt the farm as she had skirted the village, but —
the parlour Ughts shone red through the drawn curtains,
and human nature was not to be denied. Fiddles were
going apace in the house and feet were stamping, but
without not a living soul was visible. Joanna climbed
a gate into the hoppit and stole across to the nearest
red-curtained window.

A drawn curtain is well enough, but it is odds a
peep-comer is left somewhere, and Joanna was quick
enough to find one now. Hiere was nothing to see but
what anybody would expect who had heard laughter,
stamping, and the scream of fiddles: lads and lasses all
arow, up to sixty years of age and beyond, ranged on
both sides of the long parlour, and Abel Robgent and
Nancy Fisk coming down the middle; after them, Sim

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286 DIVERS VANITIES.

Cloyse and Ruth Becker; and after them a^ain — Nat
Proitice and 'Ti3da Coatra.

It was not a great matter, of course, and in truth
it was what she had climbed the gate to see^ but it was
more than enough to confirm Joanna in her errand
She hurried away with bitter hate in her soul, and the
whining fiddles jeered her as she went

A mile beyond Tarpots Hall there is a fold in the
hills which makes an easier way up from the maishes,
and up this way a broken foot-track straggles. On a
side of the great furrow, near the top, and on the edge
of a little wood, there stood at this time a very small
old cottage — one might say a hut — clap-boarded and
very ill-thatched. This was tiie goal of Joanna's journey,
and the home of old Sukey Black, a character of no
great favour hereabouts.

She lived alone; gathered her fuel in the wood close
by, or in any place where it might be found; did a little
field work, though not much; and eked out by b^ging
such trifles as she might need — an egg or two, a jug of
skim-milk, bam-swecpings to feed the half-dozen lank
fowls that roosted on sticks behind the hut — things that
few cared to refuse her, since they cost Uttle or nothbg,
and might avert a greater loss. Fot, indeed, it was held
a bad thing to "go crossways" with Sukey Black; you
must speak her civil, also, and cover your thumbs with
youi fingers as you did it: sure guard against a witch.

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THE TORN HEART. 287

And it was to Sukey Black that Joanna was coming,
since Miuxell was impossible. A feebler aid, no doubt;
but a very cunning woman.

Joanna crossed the combe and neared Sukey Black's
door — moving with no hesitation now. She took one
look about her, and then, with just a moment's effort,
rapped at the door.

For some little while there was no answer, and she
rapped again. Then she started violently at the sudden
appearance of Sukey Black's face at the little window
close by her shoulder.

Her first impulse was to run. But then the latch
clicked and the door opened. Sukey Black stood on
the threshold in an odd huddle of old clothes, for she
had been roused from bed. She was bent and brown
and large-featured, uid it was plain to see, even in the
dim moonlight, that there was some remnant of old
gypsy blood in Sukey Black.

"It fare late, my dearie," said the old woman, "for
yow to come a-wisitin' to me. But love'U send a maid
a far journey, even o' Christmas Eve. Do I know 'ee,
dearie? Your hood be drawed that close "

The old woman leaned and peered, gripping under
her chin the shawl that covered her head. "Why," she
went on, "ben't it Cap'en Bell's darter, o' Leigh — Miss
Joanna? Yes — I see 'ee now, my dearie. Come you in."

Sukey Black's tongue did not always run so pleasantly,

288 DIVEBS VANITIES.

but tonight she scented profit No giii would come at
this time of this cold night from Leigh for nothing; in-
deed, there could be scarcely more than one sort of
trouble that would send her, as Sukey had hinted in
her first greeting.

She knelt and blew on the embers of the wood fire,
throwing on more twigs till the flames crackled up and
lit the room fitfiilly.

"An' what bet to-night, dearie?" the old woman
asked presently. "Love'll drive a maid a far journey.
Do he give 'ee pain, dearie?"

Sukey Black could talk with a tender croon that
would draw the confidence of the timidest girl, and in
three minutes Joanna was sobbing out the poor litUe
sorrows that were so great, and the wise old woman
knew more of them than she herself ever guessed.

"Help me, Mrs. Black," Joanna entreated; "do help
me. I den't know I loved him so till now — I den't!
An' I've been a fool an' lost him! Give me something
to bring him back!"

"But the other gal," old Sukey said, warily; "she've
been to Cunnin' Murr'U for that same thing, as yow do
tell. I dussen't go crossways with Cunnin' Murr"!!! She
shook her head and screwed her wrinkled mouth. " No,
nol I coont do it, sarten to say! An' do it or no^
'twould do no good — not agen Cunnin' Murr'U!"

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THE TORN HEART. 289

"But is there no other way? I can't lose Nat! Isn't
there something?"

The wriniled old mouth screwed and worked amain,
and the deep-set old eyes looked furtively in Joanna's fare.

"Aye," said Sukey Black. '"Tis arl a chance there
be one thing. But 'tis different"

"Tell me— what?"

"Yow might putt simimat on the gaL"

Joanna caught her breath. "Not — not to kill her?"
she whispered.

The old woman shook her head. "Not if you den't
want But to tonnent her most hainish, an' drive her, -
an' tear her heart away from him. If ye'II do it Will
ye do it? "Tis for yow to say an' for yow to do, when
I tell 'ee how. Will 'ee do it?"

Joanna paused a moment, while something that
checked her utterance turned over in her throat and
subsided. Then she said, "Yes, I'll do it"

Why not? Was she not suffering torments herself?
Had not Nat been torn away from her? Indeed she
would do it, whatever it was.

"Then ye shall, dearie. But 'tis a doubt if 'ee can
do 't till after to-morrow. "Tis no good after twelve to-
night, for 'twill be Christmas Day,"

"What must I do?"

"What will 'ee give me if I tell 'ee, dearie? Will 'ee
make it five shillun, now?"

Da,4Tt Vanititl. '9

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290 DIVERS VANITIES.

"I witi give you tei if only it will do it. It's all I've
got with me."

"Good go with 'ee, my dearie, an' ye'U never lose by
it An' ye won't tell, will 'ee? Nobody? 'Tis for your
use, an' it fare hard to be ill-tret for a witch. Tis for
yow an' your heart's delight, I tell 'ee. An' ye'U never
tell? Tliey'll call 'ee witch, too, if 'ee do."

"No, of course I'll never tell — for my own sake, as
well as yours. Now what is it?"

The old woman pulled a little roll of red cloth from
under her bed, and a pair of scissors. "First," she said,
■ "tell me her name."

"'Tilda Coates."

"'Tilda Coates, eh? Matilda Coates, to be true to
name. Can 'ee write it on paper?"

"Yes, but— but — my handwriting "

"'Tis no matter — I bum it"

Joanna took the scrap of paper offered her, and
wrote the name.

"Ye ha'n't e'er a bit of her hair, dearie? No? Then
tis no matter, I can do well with anoather thing I hev.

And now see " Sukey Black opened the door and

pointed. "Yow see that bush? Tis wild brier. Break
seven thorns from that — seven big thorns from low on
the stem, and bring them here."

The moon was now up, and its light waxed and
waned as the little douds crowded across its face. The

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THE TORN HEAKT. 29 I

brier stood twenty yards away, and Joanna fetched the
seven thorns as she was bid. When she regained the
hut it was plain that the old witch had been at work in
her absence. There was a smell as of burning leather
or hair, and in her hand Sukey held a piece of red
cloth, neatly cut in the shape of a heart, and smeared
with a cross of ashes.

"Take it in hand, dearie," said the old woman;
whispering now, and continuing to whisper to the end.
"Take it in hand, and drive in one thorn, countin' one.
Then another, an' count two; an' a third, countin' still,
an' so til! the seven are all driven in. This is the be-
ginnin' o' the torment Do 'ee know where she be?"

"Yes — at Tarpots Hall." Joanna also whispered
now, though she could never have told why.

"The nearer it be the stronger the spell an' the
heavier the torment Take now to the thorns again
Pull out the first, an' drive it in again, sayin' 'M' for the
first letter o' the name, and so through the name to the
end. An' when the name be finished 'twill be on the
last thorn but one. Then bt^;in the name again on the
last thorn and spell through again an' again, never missin'
a thorn till yow come even once more, and drive the last
thorn with the last letter. An' then yow must count
again. So the torment increases. An' the nearer, the more
hainish. An' it may be if it goes near enough an' sharp
an' terr'ble enough, she'll be drawed forth in her agony an'

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292 DtVBRS VANITIES.

torment to tiy and take the heart from 'ee; an' 'tis then
'ee must tear the heart — tear it strong an' quick from
top to bottom at a rent, an' all's your own, dearie — all's
your own then. But ye must do it before midnight, for
tiien all spells come to nought, an' needs ye must wait
over the day. An' now go, dearie, an' luck go with 'ee!"

The whisper ceased, and Joanna stood without, stab-
bing the heart with thorns. Over the broken ground she
went, under the clearing moon, toward Taipots Hall,
counting and spelling, and stabbing unceasingly. She
stumbled among stones and holes and in furze-bushes,
but she never fell, and she never broke her task. The
night froze hard, but the sweat beaded and ran on her
face as she went, bedevilled, doing the Fiend's work for
love, and stabbing the heart with thorns.

So she neared the place of the dance, walking ever
with an exaltation that was strangely like terror, count-
ing and stabbing. Till at last she sank behind a furze-
bush near the house, with her eyes fixed now on the
lighted windows as she stabbed and spelt on, mechanically.
So she crouched for some minutes, never ceasing her
spell; till she saw something that struck her dumb and
Dtotionless.

For out from the house came a figure in white,
walking toward her, its hand upon its breast On it
came, steady and straight, the hand clutching the breast
as a suffering woman's hand will; and Joanna knew this

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mE TORN HEART. 2^3

for her enemy. The girl's face was drawn with her
pain, and as she neared and neared, Joanna gripped
tight on the heart with both hands, till her body was
like stone, and her soul was filled with an unspeakable
horror. So Tilda Coates came and cam^ and at last
stood over her, and their eyes met; and at that, with one
bursting effort and a loud scream, Joanna tore the heart
asunder. There was a sound in her ears as of a crash
of thunder, and she knew no more.

When once more her eyes were opened they gazed
into other eyes dose above them — and the eyes were
Nafs! Could it be real? Was it a dream — heaven —
what? Nat held her in his arms — kissed her; and there
was music— rsinging.

The moon was overhead still, wading in the mottled
clouds. "Nat," she said, "is it you? What is this?"

"Christmas morning," ssud Nat, "this veiy minute,
pretty near. But what are ye doing out here like this?
Did you hear the gun? Oad Cap'en JoUyfax fixed the
brass swivel at twelve exact, to start the carollers, he
said Hear 'em now. But you've had a turn — what
brought you out here?"

Joanna looked about her, and saw that the party
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294 DIVERS VANITIES.

from Tarpots Hall were standing in a gapii^ ling about
them. She whispered: 'Til tell you, Nat — another time.
Forgive me, Nat"

Here the carollers over by the house broke into a
merrier song —

To-monow shall be my dandng day,
I would my true love may so chance

To bear me sing fiom tir away
To call my true love to my dance.

Siog oh! My love, oh!

My love, my fove, my love!

And this have I dooe for my true love!

It was Christmas judeed, and now Joanna cared no
more that her spell was broken, for Cunning Murrell's
charm was gone with it, and Nat was her own again.

And so in truth it was, for Nat Prentice and 'Tilda
Coates were never seen to walk together down nor up
Church Hill again. Further, for such as are curious in
these matters, it may be said as a fact that, in the midst
of die dancing at Tarpots Hall that night, at about the
time that Joanna left Mother Black's, 'Tilda Coates was
taken with pains at the heart and faintness, and that at
last she was driven to walk out of doors in hope of rehef
in the fresh air. There she was most indubitably startled
by a figure that rose screaming in the furze-bushes, ran

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THE TORN HEART. 295

back terrified just as old Captain Jollyfax fired the brass
gun, and forgot her pains forthwith.

But of course there were wild tales. As, for instance,
that the faintness and the spasms at the heart were no-
thing new with her, and that, in fact, all she had of
Cunning Murreli was physic for those same troubles; and
the wilder tale of some scoffer, that she suffered that
night less from the malady than from the physic, and
took no more of iL Such random talk met with the
neglect it deserved, and cast not a shadow on the in-
defeasible truth estabhshed anew by Joanna's adventure:
that no charm or spell can survive the stroke of twelve
that proclaims Christmas Day, even though it be the
work of so powerful and so white a witch as Cunning
Murreli himself.

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