Chapter IV: Part 4

"It is," I admitted, and I turned away to meet the cod-fish eye and collected expression of Sir Marmaduke Wilkins, M.R.C.S. That scientist was eating an ice with relish.

* * * * *

You may wonder what connection I trace between this episode and the life of Bovingdon Street. There is a connection; but it traced itself. I left the Muntz's stately mansion feeling in need of distraction, and that distraction I sought from Doctor Brink and James. And James was full of news.

"I've begun my professional education," she said. "I administered chloroform to a case last week. Fee sixpence. Fatty still owes it me."

I turned to Fatty for his explanations.

"Pity me," said that gentleman, "I have a hussy for a daughter. One who makes sport of her poor old father's need. I do owe her the money. I shall continue to owe it. I am entitled to owe it. I only got half-a-crown for the whole thing--anaesthetist's fee included.

"Men like Marmaduke Wilkins get a hundred guineas for the same operation. And then the patient has to pay another ten or twenty for the anaesthetist. When a high-class, if modest surgeon, like myself, consents to perform these things for a wage which would offend the dignity of a dustman, why, damme, it is his _duty_ to swindle the anaesthetist. Why----"

"What was your patient?" I asked.

"The patient? Oh, a girl in Mulberry Street. Works at the pickle factory. Pretty girl, only eighteen. James cried. Rather unprofessional, what? Now she has the cheek to ask for sixpence!"

"What was--er--the result of your high-class surgery? Is the girl alive?"

"Alive! Why, my insulting young friend, she's back again at the pickle works. Went to work on the sixth day. _My_ girls don't die."

"At work again in six days--after--after _that_! And you let her!"

"Better work than starve," said the doctor brusquely.... "How did you enjoy yourself at Hampstead this afternoon?"

*XXII*

*LOST!*

It isn't often that Dr. Brink permits himself to have emotions during business hours, but even the doctor looked astonished when O'Flannigan came into his consulting-room. We called him O'Flannigan, because he did not leave a visiting-card, and we had to call him _something_. And he spoke with a trace of the Irish accent. He was a very tall man and very stout, having dead-white hair, which he wore in curls, and a very red face. His clothes were all of them black, and they shone in places with a sort of oily lustre. He wore black gloves and a black tie, and he carried a black umbrella.

"Evenin', Doctorrr," said he; "ut's a fine place ye got hearrr!"

The doctor bowed.

"Ut is a fine place," repeated the visitor, tapping the oilcloth with his umbrella point; "but, begad, 'tis a mericle how you kin do ut. Privut inkum purrhaps?"

"Why, yes," acknowledged Dr. Brink, "my income is certainly a private matter."

"The divil ut is!" commented the visitor. "Me own's so damned privut Oi've lost sight of ut this ten yeers past. Midwifery connection is good, Oi onderstand. Ut's a sound, domestic practus, Doctorrr?"

The doctor nodded. Wonder had made him speechless.

"That's good now," ejaculated the visitor, holding tight to the mantelpiece as he fished with his umbrella for a chair. "Give me a sound domestic practus. It's these damned Alcoholics and so forth which Oi deprecate, Doctorrr. They're no use to a man. They nevorrr pay up, they nevorrr git bettorrr, and, be jabers, they nevorrr damned well die. Ye put the takuns at three hunderrrd, Doctorrr? Begad, 'tis a poor inkum. Faith, Oi've known a man do bettorrr cuttin' corns. 'Tis a cash trade, is ut not, Doctorrr?"

"It is," said Dr. Brink. "What can I do for you?"

"Do for me?" echoed the visitor. "Whoi, if tis a drink yure profferin' me, Doctorrr, Oi will name the ush'll. Three hunderrrd, eh? Begad, 'tis a paltry inkum--a damned dirrrty, snivelling sneakin' wasp-waisted inkum for a gentleman to live upon. But 'tis a cash trade, to be shure, and there's no anxiety, to be shure. If they die, why, dammit, they die. You take yure thruppence and they take their chance. A veterinary trade, in fact, Doctorrr. Do ye walk yure rounds, Doctorrr?"

"Cab 'em," snapped out Dr. Brink.

The visitor held on to the mantelpiece with both hands. "Holy Motherrr!" he cried. "A cab is ut, ye say? On three hunderrrd? And Oi been surgeon-majorrr in th' Army! Whoi, begad, Doctorrr, I have known the toimes when half a dozen of us in th' Eightieth could drink yure cab away at a sittin'. Cab did Oi say? Be the grace of Heaven, there was gentlemen with us would dispose of a pair-horse brougham in the same period. Cab? To the divil with cabs. Oi must stump ut. Stump ut on me ten old toes. Meself, moind ye--a retired surgeon-majorrr of her late Majesty's Army. And me over sixty, Doctorrr! It is thus that Britain treats her warriors. Begad, they've even stole me pension from me. When do Oi take overr, Doctorrr?"

"Take over what?"

"Why, dammit, man," began the visitor, but his flush of anger suddenly died down. A look of bewilderment took its place. "Will ye pardon me, Doctorrr," said the visitor slowly, in a voice which sounded husky. "But tell me am Oi roight in assuming that I was privileged to meet ye hearrr lost noight?"

The doctor shook his head.

"Then," cried the visitor, moved this time by an evidently powerful emotion, "then tell me, man, for God's sake, tell me, is this not the practus I bought from ye last noight?"

"You certainly haven't bought _this_ practice," responded Dr. Brink. "It isn't for sale."

"Begad," mused the visitor, slowly rubbing his chin, "begad, Oi might have known as much. It is a fine place ye have hearrr. Ye wouldn't be for sellin' ut. Not be any means. 'Tis a fine place and a fine practus. Indeed you would be foolish to part with ut, Doctorrr. At any rate, for the sum Oi paid ye yesterday. But, begad, Oi never paid ut ye. Indeed I didn't. Was I so drunk then? Oi doubt ut.

"Hearrr am Oi, an honest, Christian man, a professor of the healun art, the noblest art which---- Begad, Oi _know_ Oi paid ut ye. And be jabers, hearrr's--hearrr's the front-door key--yure front-door key--his, Oi should say, Doctorrr, which he gave me when Oi, when Oi----

"For the love of Hiven, Doctorrr, tell me--tell me truly, Doctorrr, where in Satan's name is the dirty little practus which I bought and paid for yesterday?"

*XXIII*

*THE SURVIVOR*

Everybody must still remember the sensational explosion at Stoat's cordite factory in Limehouse. It was quite the talk of last year's gooseberry season. I may remind you that one departmental manager, one bookkeeper, one lady typist, and eighteen hands were utterly and instantaneously atomised; that the managing director himself sustained a shock; and that more than seventy operatives had to be removed in ambulances at the company's expense.

It will be remembered that very High Personages sent telegrams of sympathy. A sum of money was publicly subscribed for the relief and burial of the sufferers. The great heart of England was touched, though it did not leave off beating.

But those whose recollection of that horrible, soul-thrilling catastrophe is as keen as mine will remember that, viewed from the broad and enlightened standpoint of news-value, its most important feature was Mr. John Boyle. This honest artisan went up with the gentleman book-keeper and the lady typist and the hands. But unlike them he came down unbroken and almost unhurt, being so fortunate as to alight upon a providential mound of cotton-waste.

Few people will need to be reminded how this clever action was rewarded. A special (_D---- M----_) collection, amounting to nearly L300, was raised in three weeks and presented to Mr. Boyle in recognition of his courage and ingenuity. Pictures of Mr. Boyle in all varieties of dress, attitude, and employment were published in the journals. I have an especially vivid recollection of one picture, appearing in a Sunday newspaper. The photographer had caught the noteworthy features of Mr. Boyle at a particularly happy moment; and with consummate art he had represented our hero as emerging from a bad fog with a patch on his chest. This study bore the following inscription: "John Boyle at Home: He nurses the baby."

The next stage in Mr. Boyle's development, or (to state it more correctly) in the development of the public attitude towards Mr. Boyle, was his engagement to appear at the Shoreditch Hippodrome in a dramatic entertainment called "The Man Who was Blown Up."

But by the time he had reached this altitude of greatness the fame of Mr. Boyle was already well established; his name had become familiar to the national ear. For months before the day of Mr. Boyle's historic decision to blend his destiny with that of the national drama it had been a common thing to hear men say to other men: "'Ullo, Charlie; been 'avin' one with Boyle?"

This oft-repeated sally, which never failed to provoke laughter, was popularly supposed to embody a charge of alcoholic excess.

In these days, when Mr. Boyle as "The Man Who was Blown Up" has enjoyed three hundred consecutive nights of fame, it is regarded as a silly thing to joke about him. He is now a solemn National fact.

But it was my own particular good fortune to meet Mr. Boyle at a period when the hand of Fame had barely touched him. I made his acquaintance within twenty-four hours after the tremendous moment which had so exalted Mr. Boyle and his fortunes.

Mr. Boyle, having been detained for a brief period at a local infirmary, was anointed with surgical balm and dismissed; when he immediately came round to the sixpenny surgery of Dr. Brink, demanding a certificate of injuries which should enable him to extract some monetary compensation from the coffers of Stoat's Cordite Works, Limited. Mr. Boyle was not then prognostic of the public rewards which awaited him.

Mr. Boyle having stated his business, the doctor became excited and summoned me to leave the hiding-place and join him openly in the consulting-room.

"This chap," he explained, "is John Boyle, who was blown up with other employed objects at the cordite works, and who is still alive. If you are a real journalist you will get 'copy' out of him."

I took Mr. Boyle by the hand and I said to him--

"You have had an awful experience, old chap. My God, you have lived through an awful thing."

Mr. Boyle said: "I believe you, guv'nor. Now this is a funny thing, ain't it. I was 'it on the leg by somethink; and whatever it was, it went right through me trouser but never 'urt the sock. Funny thing, that, ain't it?"

"Quite extraordinary," I admitted. "All the other poor chaps in your shop are dead, aren't they?"

"Twelve chaps and four females; all dead," admitted Mr. Boyle. "Funny thing, wasn't it? Right through me trouser and never touched the sock!"

"Eighty injured from the other shops!" I reflected. "What did you think--how did you feel, when--when you realised it all?"

"I never thought much abaht it," responded Mr. Boyle. "Me leg was 'urtin'."

"It isn't a matter one need encourage him to think about," suggested the doctor.

"I can't 'elp thinking about one thing, though," interpolated Mr. Boyle. "Such a funny thing: Right through----"

"It must have been an awful moment," I hazarded, "when you came to your senses and looked about and saw the--the awfulness of it. What did you do?"

"I don't remember, not clearly," responded Mr. Boyle.... "I know I laughed. It seemed so queer for anything to rip right through a person's trouser-leg and not go near 'is sock."

*XXIV*

*MORE OF PRUDENCE*

Prudence and midday post arrived together at Baffin's washhouse on the day appointed for her second stance.

"Oo-er, Mr. Baffin," was her greeting: "_I_ got your letters. Gimme the stamps, wown't you? Me an' my friend we allus c'lect stamps. We ain't gointer stop till we got ten thousand, and then we're gointer make a bonfire when my mother's out. 'Ere, an' I ain't bin 'avin' _'arf_ a lark with your postman, Mr. Baffin. Oo, an' the conductor on the bus what I come by, 'e wasn't 'arf drunk, I tell you. I was frightened, I was, 'cos my father useder git drunk, an' once 'e bit my mother. 'E _was_ a bad man, my father, an' they made 'im go out an' be a soldier in Egypt, an' 'e got the fever in 'is 'ead, an' we got a picture of 'im at 'ome before 'e was buried, an' you ought to see the funny black man a-settin' alongside of 'im. 'Ere, I'm all in a knot at the back, Mr. Baffin: arst your friend to undo me. An' don't you foget to keep them stamps, an' I spoge it's the chin agen, an' I 'ope you've remembered the muffins!"

"Yes," responded Baffin, "I remembered to get the muffins, and I've also remembered to get an empty flour-sack. Know what that's for?"

Prudence shook her head--gravely, wonderingly.

"To smother up tiresome girls in that _will_ wriggle and _will_ talk," explained Baffin.

"He! he!" giggled Prudence. "Wown't tie up _me_, I know. 'Cos if you was to do that you couldn't paint me. See?" She gurgled with triumph.

"And now," said Baffin, "it is time to leave off playing. Sit up, like a good girl, and keep quiet. Get rid of that bull's-eye."

"Yes," said Prudence. And the lollipop was "got rid of" of by a simple and effective means. "I _should_ laugh if someone was to tread on it," observed Prudence. "If my mother was to see---- Oo-er, Mr. Baffin, down't 'oller at me, please, Mr. Baffin. I _will_ be good, I will; on'y, if you look like that I shall cry, 'Cos you frighten me."

Silence reigned for a little space, whilst Prudence, with clenched hands, maintained an attitude of strenuous repose. Baffin's actions alternated between brief and seemingly motiveless dabs at his canvas, and a critical inspection of his model, for the purposes of which he spread out his legs and wagged his head--slowly and pensively, from side to side--like an elderly cockerel surveying the domestic landscape. This proceeding terminated in a sigh that had all the eloquence of a shout, and Baffin pounced, as it were, upon his canvas.

Prudence selected this moment in which to throw up both her hands, and wail with sorrow. "Ooh," she moaned, "ooh, I am a bad gel, I am. Ooh, what will my mother say when I go 'ome? She give me a letter to powst, she did, an' I never powsted it, an' it's a letter for our landlord, it is, an' I promised faithful to put it into the first box I come to. An' now I've fogot it, I 'ave, an' my mother 'll be cross. An' I love my mother, I do, an' she's got a bad place on her arm, an' I am a bad, wicked gel to tease an' trouble 'er, I am. Oo-er, I must get up and go out, Mr. Baffin. I must, 'cause I fogot to powst my mother's letter."

Baffin did the philosophic thing: put away his canvas, and put on the kettle, and invited his sitter to unsit and rejoice. That young person responded to this invitation by sitting wonderfully silent--strangely still--for ten minutes. It was only at the very end of this unique performance that we perceived her to be shedding tears. Real tears, this time.

It was possible in that moment to realise that Prudence had passed her twenty-second year. Baffin touched her shoulder, and she shrank from him and shuddered. She spoke, and her voice was the voice of a woman. "Lemme alone: lemme alone. You donnow what a un'eppy gel I am. You--you----"

It finished in a gurgle.

Then, with the laudable motive of clearing the air, Baffin referred in a tone of banter to the still visible presence of red flannel. The success of his experiment amazed us both. All in a moment the whims and capers of infancy possessed her again, and she succumbed to an ecstasy of wriggles.

"Ooh, 'ere, 'ere, Mr. Baffin; 'ere, I say, what do you think some man 'as done? Some man 'as sent me a--a something: a underneath something, all white. Yes, reely!"

"An' my mother says it didn't 'arf cost somethink, neether. But ain't 'e got a cheek to do it? 'Cos it ain't right for a man to send presents like that to a gel when she's grown up: 'cos my mother says it's takin' a liberty. Whoever sent me it, 'e must 'a' been a artist because of the tasty yoke. My mother says as I'm a grown-up gel now, an' I got to be very pertickler.

"Oo, it is pretty, though, I tell you: pink ribbon on the shoulders, an' my mother says 'ooever 'e is 'e oughter be ashamed of 'isself, an' all my gel cousins from Catford are comin' on Sunday to 'ave a look, an' when I find out 'oo it is, my mother says I can tell 'im what I think of 'im."

Stimulated and cheered by the thought of this exciting prospect, Prudence fell upon the muffins. Her appetite, at any rate, was thoroughly grown up, and, having performed a veritable gastronomic feat, she curled herself up on the musty old curtain which carpeted Baffin's "throne" and--went to sleep.

Whereupon, the unauthorised kittens--they crawled everywhere--you found them in the milk jug--promptly employed the skirts of Prudence as a playground.

"Move those kittens away, like a good chap," Baffin called out to me. "They'll worry Prudence when she wakes up. Hates the silly beggars, you know."

But to our surprise, when Prudence did wake up, she stretched forth a foot, and began to tease the plumpest of them with the point of her shoe.

"Funny objec's, ain't they, when they're fat and soft, like this?" said Prudence. "Breakable, ain't they? No strength in their legs. On'y fit to lie on their backs an' be tickled."

And Prudence stooped down, and lifted the plump one into her lap.

"Ooh, my! 'is little pores ain't 'arf soft!" She spoke in the woman's voice that we had heard but once before. "'Is little pores ain't 'arf soft; you could bite 'em."

She kissed a paw.

"Ain't 'e got a funny morsel of a nose. Sich a cheeky nose; such a teeny one. You could bite it. You--you----"

She lifted the absurd little animal to her face, and rubbed her cheek against his cosy side, and she kissed his impertinent nose.

"Oo's a precious, then!" continued Prudence. "Oo's a sleepy precious. My, 'e's a sleepy little 'elpless little lump of fat! Ain't you, boy? What price a see-saw, fat boy?"

She held him so that he hung by his shoulders in an attitude that was not suggestive of dignity. And she dandled and bounced him in a manner with which kittens are not familiar. She lifted him to her face again, and made as if to kiss the nose once more.

But the lips, half bunched for that purpose, parted suddenly, as if with pain--as if with wonder--as if with horror. The kitten slipped from her fingers, and fell with an indignant mew into the soft, warm haven of her lap. And Prudence's hands went up to her startled face, and her hair fell over her like a shroud, and she sobbed as women sob.

"Oh, Gawd!" she cried; "its eyes, its eyes! Its little, winkin' eyes! Oh, mother, _mother_!"

*XXV*

*A TALK WITH JAMES*

I had extinguished the flame of the doctor's gas-stove, and was warming myself on the lid, when James burst in and interrupted me.

"Come off it, like a dear, and listen," said James. "I've had a proposal!"

I wondered, for a moment, whether this flippant manner of stating a serious fact did not call for some form of fatherly rebuke. But all that I actually said was: "Well, I hope you think you've started soon enough."

"Started!" echoed James, regarding me with an air as of dignified amazement. "My dear young man, I _started_ years ago. Why, Baffin was my third; and Baffin began to woo me before I was eleven."

"How long ago was that?" I meekly inquired.

"Don't you be rude," said James. "I take a grown-up size in almost everything. If Baffin perseveres, I suppose I shall really have to accept him--if it's only to make him leave off wearing those New Art ties. But, really and truly, I'd rather not be married at all. I don't believe I've got a married mind. I'm much too fond of rats."

"But," I ventured to point out, "people have been known to combine the two interests."

"Not successfully," asserted James. "Rats require a fearful lot of attention. Another thing about Baffin is his hands. I really _couldn't_ be married to them."

"Why 'another' thing?" I inquired. "You haven't stated any firstly."

"I daresay my grammar isn't quite correct, but I haven't noticed that yours is perfect," rejoined James. "And, anyhow, my ideas are sound even if my grammar is weak. Of course, one could _train_ him to take care of his nails; but with rats you have more to show for your trouble. He really was most touching."

"Baffin has a fine vein of sentiment," I admitted.

"Why Baffin?" demanded James. "I was talking about Mr. Grimsdick."

"Pardon me," I said. "You think so rapidly, and my hands are cold. Who is Mr. Grimsdick?"

"The one I was telling you about," explained James. "He's our grocer."

"But you never were telling me about him," I protested. "He is quite a new character."

"Nonsense," cried James. "Why, the very first thing I said to you was that Mr. Grimsdick had proposed to me. At least, I take it as a proposal. He held my hand and----"

"Excuse me," I ventured to observe, "but do you think it quite correct in the daughter of a respected family physician that she should go about the country holding hands with grocers? Now had it been----"

James cut short my speech with characteristic impatience. "Mr. Grimsdick," she said, "has been holding my hand for years."

"Does he sell lard?" I inquired.

"He is a very religious man, and when his wife died, when I was about seven, he used to give me raisins and pat my head to comfort himself. And this afternoon, when he gave me my change, he held my hand and he said, 'R! Miss, I expect we shall soon see you round yere shopping on your own account. How time do fly, to be shaw. You'll be having your hair up soon. And yet it don't seem no time since the days when you used to sit on the cheese barrels and swing your little legs and heat my raisins. 'E'll be a lucky young fellar whoever 'e is. They'll 'ave to 'urry up, miss, some of 'em--what? I on'y wish I was a young man--_I'd_ give some of 'em a lead.'

"So I said, 'Never mind, Mr. Grimsdick. I shall always come to you for my soap and tea.'

"And he laughed. And he said, 'R! We shan't see much of you round 'ere, I reckon, miss. You'll be marrying into the aristocracy and goin' to live at Herne Bay or Clacton.'

"So then I gave him Fatty's well-known speech about the Idle Rich.

"And he said, 'Oh! If that's your way of thinkin' there's a chance for all of us. Well, miss, there's a empty chair in my parlour and a seat be'ind the cash desk.' _I_ call that a proposal."

"A most definite and unequivocal proposal," I agreed. "What did you say next?"

"Oh," said James, "there was nothing else of importance. We got off on to the subject of Carlsbad plums: they were beauties, but too dear. He wouldn't reduce them."

"Pooh!" I cried. "And he calls himself a lover!"

"_All_ men aren't like Baffin and other people, thank goodness," said James disdainfully. "Mr. Grimsdick thinks about the future. But I'd rather go in for rats, I think. There's Baffin, for instance: he never shuts a door after him."

"Rats don't either," I submitted.

"But cats don't open them," argued James, not without logic. "And then there's always having to be at home on the second Tuesday. Really, I can't decide about my future at all. Most girls haven't any difficulties, because they can make up their minds to be nurses and relieve the sufferings of the poor. But I've been brought up to that sort of thing, and it bores me. Of course, you can always get an opium-eater, or drunkard, or something, and devote your life to reforming him. But then, again, they always smell of it. Really, it's very hard. And Baffin's so irritable. Look at the way men fuss over trifles. And if you get one who is clean and not fussy, and not a grocer, and decently young, he is sure to be ugly and a bore."

I said, "You are referring now, I suppose, to Boag, the Conative Meliorist?"

"No," replied James. "Mr. Boag is a bore, but he isn't downright ugly. As a matter of fact, I was thinking of _you_."

"Oh!" I said.

"Yes," said James. "I know you like one to be frank. Apart from everything else, men make me sick. It will really have to be rats."

*XXVI*

*THE APRIL BARGE*

I set out, sedately enough, one April morning, to rescue James from her aunt at Bayswater. I set out grandly enthroned upon a 'bus.

But I came quite unexpectedly upon this April Barge, and James and her aunt were forgotten.

The April sun had come out sharp to time, you see, and was winking fitfully upon all of us, like the unsettled, rakish fellow that he is. And a girl with two great baskets full of wondering daffodils had come out, too; and some conscienceless vagabond was extracting melody from a cornet. So that even the Regent's Canal, with its sombre vicinage and sulky craft, seemed, as if by some surprising effort, to have taken on an air of sweetness and youth and hope.

You could consider this fact at leisure as our 'bus toiled slowly up the rise of a road which spans the canal. There was a public-house in front of us--the public-house and the cornet seem to be inseparably united in this neighbourhood--but the canal was to one's left, and appeared, somehow, to convey that air of refreshment which the tavern so conspicuously lacked.

As one looked down upon the face of these waters, so strangely heartened by the sunlight, a sort of certainty grew upon him that they would break suddenly into perspective; that their vista would cease to be obscured by coal wharves and cranes and hoardings; that somebody's whisky, commended to your notice in large white letters on a blue-enamelled background, would fade and fade and fade, until it merged with the white clouds and the blue sky behind it. Then need you but sigh and sit back, beholding a silver streak set snugly between hills, and flowing, flowing, flowing to the edge of the world. Instead of which----

Pooh! There was no instead. The April sun kept winking at the daffodils, and the daffodils kept staring at the sun, and the cornet-man made music by the waterside. So that even a poet might have smiled at it all. For here, I'll swear, was none of your mere "waterways," created by syndicates for profit; here was none of your world capitals. Just a little old river, sunning itself gratefully in a little old town that God had made.

And, as if to strengthen this conceit, a woman came up through the hatchway of a barge that I was looking at. She was wearing a sun-bonnet, in accordance with the custom of barge-women, and she stood up gracefully, one hand on her hip, the other before her eyes, to seek out the cornet player.

We are the boys of the bulldawg breed
What's made ole Hengland's Nime.

Those were the words which had inspired the melody which the cornet-blower was blowing. The woman tapped her foot in time with the notes.

Her husband came up then, accompanied by tobacco clouds and a baby. He seemed to be a fortunate sort of husband, for I noticed that the woman laughed appreciatively at some joke which he made.

Then the man's eye wandered to the canal-side, and he caught sight of the daffodil-girl, who was standing there. And what must the fellow do but throw kisses to her, which gallantry was reciprocated by the flower-girl. The barge-woman laughed at this new jest with even more good humour (if that were possible) than that which she had shown before. The man shouted some message or other to the flower-girl, and she replied, whereupon he handed the baby to his wife, saying, "Catch 'old, Fatty!"--an utterance which I heard without hearing, as one can when an April sun is shining on men's hearts. And, advancing to the side of the boat, the man held out his arms, and the girl threw daffodils towards him.

The first bloom fell into the water, and the second; the third he caught. One more poor daffodil was drowned, and he caught the two next. So that there was one for his cap, and one for the missus, and one for the baby, who, being now safely delivered from the paternal arms (which were not built for cradling babies), needed but the additional stimulus of a yellow thing to marvel at ere it smiled as largely as any of them.

And upon my word I smiled, too, and could, indeed, have laughed outright. But I sat in awe of a fat man on the adjacent seat. He did not belong to that order of lunatics who laugh for nothing in the sunshine. "What we want," he was saying to his companion, "what we want," he said, with his eyes fixed tight upon this April barge, "what we want is a total _change of Government_. Nothin' won't ever be right again till we get it."

I had a heavy parcel of books on my knee, and to drop them heavily upon his foot had been, as it were, the accident of a moment. But the sweet temperance of springtime had stolen into my blood, and I forbore. Besides which there were the barges and the daffodils, and they were better worth a man's consideration than this fool.

So I looked over the side again, and saw that the barge-man had turned his attention to the cornet-blower, with whom he was exchanging highly flavoured sarcasms. With a view, probably, of adding zest to his humours, and because a springtime madness was upon him, he had changed headgear with his wife, and stood there in her sun-bonnet, grimacing and laughing. He had a long barge-pole in his hand, and somehow--I don't quite know how it happened--in assuming to hurl that weapon at the cornet-blower, he overbalanced himself, and fell sideways into the water, striking his head as he fell against the side of another barge, which was moored close to his own in that jumble fashion which is peculiar to barges.

He came up again almost directly, looking queer in his wife's sun-bonnet (for he had tied the tapes beneath his chin), and then immediately sank again. The nerveless ineptitude of it all made one angry with the man: it seemed to be wilful.

As for the wife, she looked wonderingly over the side, and realisation came to her so slowly that a laugh still flickered faintly on her face when he came up again. Even then, the sound which she uttered was as much like a chuckle as a cry. And when words came to her, they were few enough. "Oh, my pore man!" she moaned. "Oh, my pore man! Oh, my pore man!"

And the baby lay on its back, and chuckled knowingly into the petals of a dishevelled daffodil.

Our 'bus had made the bend of the canal bank by this time, and now was parallel with the water, and exactly opposite to this barge. Under the united stimulus of instinctive curiosity and instinctive horror, the driver pulled up sharp; and so the 'bus stood still, and we passengers sat there, gaping at that funny thing in the sun-bonnet as it came up for a second time and sank again.

"Oh, my pore man! Oh, my pore man!" moaned the wife.

And the cornet-blower, pale with horror, still applied himself automatically to the cornet. He had changed his tune since first I heard him, and the aquatic feats of the man in the sun-bonnet were conducted to music, the strains of which, being interpreted into words, ran as follows--

Hi! Hi! clear the road
For the rowdy, dowdy boys.

It came up again for the third time, and the woman on the barge grabbed frantically at nothing, and tore her arm in the effort, so that a crimson splash mingled with the eddying waters as he sank again.

And then the cornet-blower remembered himself, and dropped his cornet hastily, as though it burned him. And, of all queer things for a cornet-blower to do, he blubbered weakly, like a woman found out.

And the mischievous sun cast his shadow upon the water, and caused it to dance joyously thereon, so that you would have deemed it to be the shadow of one consumed with joy.

"Oh, my pore man!" cried the wife. "Oh, my pore man! Oh, my pore man!"

And the fat person from the next seat said to his friend, "I saw it comin'. The giddy fool was larkin' about like a ape." And, in the meantime, the giddy fool did not come up again.

Suddenly the flower-girl spoke. "My Gawd!" she screamed, struggling feverishly to disentangle herself from her shawl and the straps of her basket and her fringe; "my Gawd! where's all the blarsted men got to? What's 'appened to you? For Christ's sake find a _man_, you fools!"

The 'bus emptied itself, and men ran into each other along the roadway, and somebody ran for a policeman. So that there was a great deal of noise and bustle shorewards. But at the same time certain male persons of a much more silent and effective character made their appearance upon the barges adjacent to the April barge. They did not shout, and they did not run about much. They fetched poles and produced ropes, and one of their number climbed into the water at the end of one; and presently, after much probing and searching and jerking (and not a little swearing), they brought him up at the end of a barge-pole, with a slime concealing all of him except the sun-bonnet, which had slipped upon one side, and looked more comical than ever.

"Oh, my pore man!" cried the barge-woman, who by now was surrounded by a stimulating coterie of other barge-women.

"_E's_ done for!" said my fat neighbour, and spat contentedly.

And the baby snatched at its mother's head, which was still covered with her husband's hat, from which a single daffodil was dangling.

In the meantime, they laid him down upon the deck of a barge, and relays of men, acting under the direction of a policeman, jerked at his arms, and pulled his legs, and pummelled his chest. But, as the fat man had said, _he_ was done for, and these exhausting efforts only made the baby laugh. So they lifted him hurriedly, with a change of manner, as befitted a changed burden, and conveyed him to the shore, where he was placed upon an ambulance and deported.

The fat man formed himself into an impromptu committee of inspection. He returned to his friend (and my side) after a lengthy dalliance by the ambulance, and spoke as one well pleased.

"Crack in 'is 'ead as long as my 'and. 'Orrible! Never noted afore that blood 'ad such a salty smell to it. Quite sickly, ain't it? To think of it, poor fool! ... And on a day like this, too!"

And he took off his hat and sunned himself. "I'm for a drink arter all that," he added; and, his companion agreeing with him, he walked over to the tavern, in company with many other of the 'bus passengers, and the driver and conductor of that vehicle, and most of the barge-men.

They took the cornet-blower with them, and somebody collected a store of coppers in that musician's interest, with which he was presented upon the understanding that he should "bite off a yard o' somethink lively" to cheer the mourning host withal.

So while the woman on the barge was being carried below deck by her sympathisers; whilst faint gurgles issued from the daffodil-girl, standing over her baskets by the water-side; whilst the sun winked down upon all of us--the cornet-blower threw out his chest with an air something at variance with the muddy tears upon his cheek, and blared out a song of mourning.

Leave off tickerlin', leave off tickerlin',
Leave off tickerlin', Jock!

sang the mourners; and the jolly young sun must have winked itself into a headache.

By the time our 'bus went on again every note of tragedy save one had departed from the scene. That solitary note was supplied by the daffodil-girl, who stood by her garden dabbing disconsolately at her nose and eyes with an apron-end.

Nought was stirring on the April barge, save one plump little figure, which squatted all by itself in the centre of the deck. They had forgotten the baby in this coil. But the baby was quite happy--happier than any of them. For it sat there, eating its father's cap, and smiling amiably at the sunshine, as who should know that there is a benign and beautiful purpose in everything, even unto the falling of a sparrow.

The daffodils upon the waterside, pressing each other close within their baskets, stared up into the heavens more wonderingly than ever.

*XXVII*

*THE CASE OF MRS. ROPER*

"Beg pardon, young fellar," said Mrs. Roper, "but ain't you the young fellar from the doctor's?"

Mrs. Roper is a sullen-eyed lady with very many chins. She is, _vide_ her shop sign, a dealer in antiques, and, to quote the same authority, old metal, old teeth, old glass and china, and every variety of new and second-hand wearing apparel are bought and sold by her. She is not the cleanest woman in London, nor is her shop the cleanest in Bovingdon Street. But there is charm in the variety and abundance of Mrs. Roper's assets, which are the working parts, as it were, of our complex civilisation, amongst which tokens Mrs. Roper is always sitting, silently, mournfully, by day and night, like a lonely widow on a coral reef, surrounded by mementoes of a shipwreck.

I hastened to reply with civility to Mrs. Roper's question, for that lady had just sold to me for ninepence an ancient brass tobacco jar, which expert opinion has since valued at half a guinea.

"Then," said Mrs. Roper, "I will thank you to send the doctor round 'ere. Tell 'im that the stuff what 'e calls medicine is makin' me worse."

"Madam," said I, thinking rather of my benefactress than of my friend, "the doctor is outside now. Shall I----?"

"I thought I seed the shadder of 'is 'at," said Mrs. Roper; "call 'im in."

I called the doctor, as directed, and he came in with a brisk and cheerful air, kicking me brutally upon the shin in passing. I then, very naturally, prepared to retire; but Mrs. Roper held me back.

"_You_ needn't run away, young man," she said. "I ain't ashamed for anybody to 'ear _my sufferings_.... Doctor, what's to be done about me? I'm very ill."

"Where?" said Dr. Brink, a little brusquely.

"It's a funny question for a doctor to ask," responded Mrs. Roper. "I thought we paid you to find things out. But we do not want to waste each other's time, and so I'll tell you.

"What's the matter with me is that I'm dying. That yellow medicine what you sent me 'as brought the pains on worse than ever. You will 'ave to try me with some red. Not that I look to that or any other doctor's stuff to cure me now. Nothing can't cure me now. I've been neglected too long. The on'y thing I got to look forward to now is me little wooden ulster. It'll be a great pleasure to some people, I know, the day the undertaker comes to measure me for it. What are you laughin' at?"

"I wasn't laughing," protested the doctor. "I was yawning."

"Then what are you yawning at?"

"Up all night," explained the doctor.

"Ah!" quoth Mrs. Roper mysteriously, "I see, _you're_ one of the jolly sort.... What you gointer do about me?"

The doctor equivocated. "Where's your husband?" he said.

Mrs. Roper closed both eyes and shook her head. "Wherever the man may be," she responded, "you may be sure as it ain't be the bedside of 'is dying wife. '_E's_ one of your jolly sort, likewise. 'E's one o' them good-tempered, popular fellars, 'e is. _'E_ don't want no medicine."

"I was not proposing to give him any medicine," explained the doctor. "I would like to talk to him concerning the painful state of--ah--health in which--ah--you find yourself. When will he be in?"

"Ain't you got some more riddles you would like to ask a person?" responded Mrs. Roper, with a bitter laugh. "How in gracious do _I_ know when the man will be in? 'E's one of these _pleasant_ men, I tell you. The sort as is always ready with a laugh or a joke or a funny remark. 'E ain't got time, bless you, to trouble 'is jolly self about no wives. 'E's one of your 'appy men--the sort that makes friends, and so on. 'E would rather be out with 'is friends, 'e would, listenin' to their flattery, than sit at 'ome 'ere with 'is lawful wife and 'ear the _truth_ about 'isself. 'E's a plain man, too, and stammers 'orrible."

"I think," suggested Dr. Brink, "that I shall have to call again when he is in, and talk things over with him. I can see," added my excellent and ambiguous friend, "that what you want is more attention."

"What I want," retorted Mrs. Roper, "is me wooden ulster. The sooner the better. Attention won't save me now--even if I could get it. I'm gone too far. And what is the use of a 'usband's idea of attention? If you want to see the kind of attention 'e gives me, just cast your eye on the table there. Them things in the corner is supposed to be lemons. '_E_ sent them in. _Look at 'em_! 'E on'y sent 'em 'cause I asked 'im, mind you. Is it much to ask, d'ye think, Doctor? And me at death's door! Look at 'em, I say. They're furrin lemons."

There was a pause. Then said Mrs. Roper again, "They're furrin lemons. I would say it to 'is face. I ask 'im on me death-bed for lemons and 'e sends me them! Furrin ones! Don't you think they're furrin, Doctor?"

"I'm sure of it," replied the doctor.

There was another pause, during which Mrs. Roper applied a variety of new and second-hand wearing apparel to her eyes. But the gift of articulation soon returned to her.

"I," she explained, with biting irony, "am on'y 'is wife. _I_ ain't jolly. _I_ don't flatter 'im. _I_ don't make a fuss of 'im. _I_ don't make meself agreeable. _I'm_ on'y 'is wife. _I_ on'y tell 'im the truth. What does 'e wanter give good lemons to _me_ for?"

"If you could let me know when he returns," submitted Dr. Brink, "I would talk these matters over with him. In the meantime, I will send you round some medicine, which----"

"What's the good of medicine to _me_?" demanded Mrs. Roper. "I'm on'y 'is wife. You go round to the undertaker's, Doctor, and tell 'im to send me round a wooden ulster. That's the on'y thing as'll bring _me_ any peace. I ain't one of your jolly sort, you see. _I_ don't go round to me cousin Alfered's and make meself agreeable and play nap. 'Is cousin Alfered's, indeed! It isn't 'is cousin Alfered as 'e goes to visit, Doctor; you take my word for _that_, Doctor; I s'pose I'm blind, eh, Doctor? An' deaf an' dumb an' parulised? I s'pose I ain't aware that cousin Alfered 'as got a wife? _A wife_! That's what 'e calls 'er! If she's a honest married woman, Doctor, 'ow d'you account for 'er bein' ser very lovin' to 'er 'usband?"

"I have left off trying to account for these things," explained the doctor. "About your medicine now. I want you----"

But Mrs. Roper had struck a more fascinating theme than that of medicine. "Married!" she ejaculated. "Ha! Married! And she ser jolly! Ser good-tempered, ser fussy, ser full o' compliments! No wonder as my man likes to play nap at 'is cousin Alfered's. There's two or three jolly ones together in _that_ 'ouse.

"She's a 'igh-spirited lady too. Ser full of romps an' all. She reads the papers, too, and listens to their jokes, _and laughs_.

"Well, well, Doctor, it's time that wooden ulster come. It won't arrive before I'm ready for it. This world ain't no fit place for me.

"I ain't jolly enough.

"I'm only a honest wife, I am, what sits at 'ome all day an' tells the truth while other people makes theirselves ser popular. This world is no fit place for honest wives.

"The other ladies are ser jolly; they makes theirselves ser pleasant. They fuss about and flatter you, and laugh at all your jokes. They makes theirselves ser pleasant....

"What's a respectable married woman to do, Doctor?"

*XXVIII*

*THE BLACK HAT*

"What I like Banking Day for," James had privately informed me, "is because _then_ Fatty always puts on a cap. He looks so plain and friendly in a cap."

At which I pondered deeply.

That which I pondered was the important problem of Dr. Brink in his relationship to moral authority and the top-hat.

I had to admit to myself that James's aphorism was justified by facts. The doctor did look more human in a cap. Upon the other hand, he did not in the least look like himself.

"Banking Day" is a solemn occasion in the Brink household. It happens once a fortnight. It affords the doctor an excuse for making holiday--a two hours holiday--the only regular holiday in which he permits himself to indulge. And of this regular and recurrent festival, the cap is an outward and visible sign: the cap and golfing shoes and a poacher's jacket. And a solemn black bag. The solemn black bag is filled with sixpenny pieces. Thus equipped, the doctor goes into the City--"giving'em a treat in Gracechurch Street," he calls it--and deposits the toll which he has extracted from human misery upon some banker's table. He then returns to Bovingdon Street, wearing your right usurer's leer and a shilling cigar. And having in his right hand--the hand he pulls the teeth out with--a fat, white book. It is his vulgar custom, upon such occasions, to publish loudly a statement of accounts, as thus--

"Forty-eight pounds fourteen and sixpence. Do you hear that, my friend? Do _you_ hear it, Baffin? One thousand nine hundred and forty-nine sixpences. Does this compete with literature, young man? Does it equal the material gains of your art, Mr. Baffin? Nineteen hundred sixpences, James, my dear, nineteen hundred and forty-nine. All screwed out of the working man. Damn the working man. What's he made for? Where's that bottle of Burgundy?"

The doctor, in this mood, presents an absurdly human appearance. His cap---it is an old-fashioned neck-freezer, and a trifle small for him at that--sits usually upon one side, and he rolls the cigar between his lips in an unctuous manner, and has even been known to wear his feet upon the mantel-piece. It is always his pleasure under these circumstances to toy with Baffin, who, being so closely related to the Leicestershire Baffins, is quite unjustly credited with a secret sympathy for despotism. In point of fact, however, Baffin has no time to sympathise with anything, except the Baffin School of Impressionist Art. But the doctor, when his cap and the cares beneath it sit lightly on him, chooses to exhibit a cordial sympathy for the supposed convictions of Baffin.

"Dirty beggars, these working men: what, Baffin?" the doctor will observe. "Have to be kept in their places. Eh? What? Sixpence a go, Baffin. Nineteen hundred and forty-nine sixpences. A very reasonable tribute, Baffin; a tribute to education and elegance and the cultivated mind. The feudal system, Baffin, was a fool to our system. You must write and explain it all to the Leicestershire Baffins. What, Baffin?"

Baffin always offered the same reply--

"You _are_ a silly fool, Brink."

Even the surrounding helots recognised and responded to the psychological significance of the doctor's City costume. I shall always remember an observation uttered by Ma Levinsky, who kept the fish shop at the corner.

It was Banking Day, and the doctor, suitably apparelled and accompanied by the bag, was walking West, accompanied by your servant, to whom he had promised to exhibit the interior of a real bank, and also to show how one conducts an operation called "paying in." And when we passed her, Ma Levinsky spoke to us, saying, "Cheero, Doctor, ole love. Got a baby in the bag?" This to THE DOCTOR, mind you! You perceive the weird magic of this cap.

But even the two hours of holiday which the doctor "stood himself" on Banking Days would come to an end, although it was not the least remarkable fact connected with the whole absurd proceeding that the two hours in question began at two o'clock and did not end till half-past six. But when they did end, the doctor's sudden masquerade would also end. The poacher's coat, the golfing shoes, would vanish, and in their place appeared the solemn calf--gent's heavy walking--the not less solemn morning coat--a somewhat tarnished vestment, but of undeniable solemnity--and, lastly, the solemnest thing of all, the final token, the apotheosis--the doctor's black silk hat.

It was a profoundly aged hat. A hat of many lustres, the which had swallowed up its own. But it was a _hat_--a black silk hat, and being such it complied with all the conditions: it sufficed: it left no room for criticism. And you did not catch the doctor looking human when he had that hat on.

I will not pretend that the doctor loved his hat. "It's the price which I pay for my soul, this damned thing," he once explained to me. "I hate to have to take it out with me, but Democracy insists. Democracy has a sense of what is due to it. In Norfolk, you could wear what you liked--your mother's bonnet if you wanted to. But you couldn't think what you liked or love what you liked. Dammit, you couldn't even swear at what you liked. Here, you are at liberty to do what you jolly well please; but as to wearing what you please--why, that's another matter. The doctor is known by his hat. They look for the hat. They expect that. They _pay_ for the hat. And being an honest sort of chap (at bottom), I give them what they pay for. This one cost me ten-and-sixpence."

Neither Ma Levinsky nor her rich relations would dare to bandy chaff with the doctor when he was the doctor--when he wore the hat. Even the leisured classes, airing their minds and matter as they propped up the fabric of the "African Chief," forbore to utter even a whisper of native pleasantry. Even the Jew-boys reserved the shafts of their wit for meaner quarry. The black hat awed them all.

I remember a certain Banking Day when I persuaded the doctor, cap and all, to enter a public-house. It was called by the name of the "Four Soldiers," and a board outside its windows proclaimed that Devonshire cyder could be had within. But when we got within we found that somebody had won some money at somebody else's expense, and that this event was being celebrated. And our advent was accordingly received with criticism and comment: wherefore we departed--quick.

But hardly had we arrived at the surgery when a messenger appeared--a rather anguished messenger, not very lucid. I answered his ring myself, and can therefore speak authoritatively.

"Dockeratome, young man?"

"Yes," I said.

"Telms wanted, quick. Ole Joe Black. Up the pole. Barmy. See? Murder, see? Telms wanted."

"Where?" I inquired.

"Never mind where," responded this helpful emissary. "Telms wanted.... Dockeratome?" he finally demanded, after a reflective pause.

I called the doctor down to him at that stage; and the doctor helped him to unlock his bosom. We found that old Joe Black and his complicated infirmities were to be found at the "Four Soldiers"--the very house of cheer which had so cheerfully exported us about five minutes ago.... I--I wilted. The doctor smiled. He also put his hat on.