Chapter IV: “bill Bailey” Comes Again (1)

A year later I bought a new car. It possessed four cylinders and an innumerable quantity of claims to perfection. The engine would start at the pressure of a button; the foot-brake and accelerator never became involved in an unholy alliance; it could climb any hill; and outlying portions of its anatomy adhered faithfully to the parent body. Pedestrians and domestic animals no longer took refuge in ditches at our approach. On the contrary, we charmed them like Orpheus with his lute; for the sound of our engine never rose above a sleek and comfortable purr, while the note of the horn suggested the first three bars of “Onward, Christian Soldiers!”

My wife christened the new arrival The Greyhound, but The Gruffin, faithful to the memory of the late lamented Bill Bailey, never referred to it as anything but The Egg-Boiler. This scornful denotation found some justification in the car’s ornate nickel-plated radiator, whose curving sides and domed top made up a far-away resemblance to the heavily patented and highly explosive contrivance which daily terrorised our breakfast-table.

Of Bill Bailey’s fate we knew little, but since Mr. Gootch once informed us with some bitterness that he had had to sell him to a Scotchman, we gathered that, for once in his life, our esteemed friend had “bitten off more than he could chew.”

The Greyhound, though a sheer delight as a vehicle, was endowed with somewhat complicated internal mechanism, and I was compelled in consequence to retain the services of a skilled chauffeur, a Mr. Richards, who very properly limited my dealings with the car to ordering it round when I thought I should be likely to get it. Consequently my connection with practical mechanics came to an end, and henceforth I travelled with my friends in the back seat, The Gruffin keeping Mr. Richards company in front, and goading that exclusive and haughty menial to visible annoyance by her supercilious attitude towards the new car.

Finally we decided on a motor trip to Scotland. There was a luggage-carrier on the back of the car which was quite competent to contain my wife’s trunk and my own suit-case. The Gruffin, who was not yet of an age to trouble about her appearance, carried her _batterie de toilette_ in a receptacle of her own, which shared the front seat with its owner, and served the additional purpose of keeping The Gruffin’s slim person more securely wedged therein.

We joined the car at Carlisle, and drove the first day to Stirling. On the second the weather broke down, and we ploughed our way through Perth and the Pass of Killiecrankie to Inverness in a blinding Scotch mist. The Greyhound behaved magnificently, and negotiated the Spittal of Glenshee and other notorious nightmares of the bad hill-climber in a manner which caused me to refer slightingly to what might have happened had we entrusted our fortunes to Bill Bailey. The Gruffin tossed back to me over her shoulder a recommendation to touch wood.

Next day broke fine and clear, and we rose early, for we intended to run right across Scotland. I ate a hearty breakfast, inwardly congratulating myself upon not having to accelerate its assimilation by performing calisthenic exercises upon a starting-handle directly afterwards. At ten o’clock The Greyhound slid round to the hotel door, and we embarked upon our journey. Infatuated by long immunity from disaster, I dispatched a telegram to an hotel fifty miles away, ordering luncheon at a meticulously definite hour, and another to our destination—a hospitable shooting-box on the west coast—mentioning the exact moment at which we might be expected.

Certainly we were “asking for it,” as my Cassandra-like offspring did not fail to remark. But for a while Fate answered us according to our folly. We arrived at our luncheon hotel ten minutes before my advertised time, an achievement which pleased me so much that I wasted some time in exhibiting the engine to the courtly and venerable brigand who owned the hotel, with the result that we got away half an hour late. But what was half an hour to The Greyhound?

Blithely we sped across the endless moor beneath the September sun. The road, straight and undulating, ran ahead of us like a white tape laid upon the heather. The engine purred contentedly, and Mr. Richards, lolling back in his seat, took a patronising survey of the surrounding landscape. Evidently he rejoiced, in his benign and lofty fashion, to think how this glittering vision was brightening the dull lives of the grouse and sheep. Certainly the appearance of The Greyhound did him credit. Not a speck of mud defiled its body; soot and oil were nowhere obtrusive. Bill Bailey had been wont, during periods of rest outside friends’ front doors, to deposit a small puddle of some black and greasy liquid upon the gravel. The Greyhound was guilty of no such untidiness. Mr. Richards, to quote his own respectfully satirical words, preferred using his oil to oil the car instead of gentlemen’s front drives. Under his administration my expenditure on lubricants alone had shrunk to half of what it had been in Bill Bailey’s time.

But economy can be pushed to excess. Even as I dozed in the back seat, sleepily observing The Gruffin’s flying mane and wondering whether we ought not shortly to get out the Thermos containing our tea, there came a grating, crackling sound. The Greyhound gave a swerve which nearly deposited its occupants in a peat-hag; and after one or two zigzag and epileptic gambols came to a full stop.

“Steering-gear gone wrong, Richards?” I inquired.

“I don’t think so, sir,” replied Mr. Richards easily. “Seems to me it was a kind of a side sl—— Get out, sir! Get out, mum! The dam thing’s afire!”

We cooled the fervid glowing of the back-axle with a patent fire-extinguisher, and sat down gloomily to survey the wreck. Economy is the foundation of riches, but you must discriminate in your choice of economies. Axle-grease should not be included in the list. Mr. Richards, whether owing to a saving disposition or an æsthetic desire to avoid untidy drippings, had omitted—so we afterwards discovered—to lubricate the back-axle or differential for several weeks, with the result that the bearings of the off-side back wheel had “seized,” and most of the appurtenances thereof had fused into a solid immovable mass.

We sat in the declining rays of the sun and regarded The Greyhound. The brass-work still shone, and the engine was in beautiful running order; but the incontrovertible and humiliating fact remained that we were ten miles from the nearest dwelling and The Greyhound’s career as a medium of transport was temporarily closed. Even the biting reminder of The Gruffin that we could still employ it to boil eggs in failed to cheer us.

Restraining an impulse to give Mr. Richards a month’s warning on the spot, I conferred with my wife and daughter. We might possibly be picked up by a passing car, but the road was a lonely one and the contingency unlikely. We must walk. Accordingly we sat down to a hasty tea, prepared directly afterwards to tramp on towards our destination.

The wind had dropped completely, and the silence that lay upon the sleepy, sunny moor was almost uncanny. Imbued with a gentle melancholy, my wife and I partook of refreshment in chastened silence. Suddenly, as The Gruffin (considerably more cheerful than I had seen her for some days) was passing up her cup for the third time, a faint and irregular sound came pulsing and vibrating across the moor. It might have been the roar of a battle far away. One could almost hear the popping of rifles, the clash of steel, and the shrieks of the wounded. Presently the noise increased in intensity and volume. It appeared to come from beyond a steep rise in the long straight road behind us. We pricked up our ears. I became conscious of a vague sense of familiarity with the phenomenon. The air seemed charged with some sympathetic influence.

“What is that noise, Richards?” I said.

“I rather _think_, sir,” replied Mr. Richards, peering down the road, “that it might be some kind of a——”

Suddenly I was aware of a distinct rise of temperature in the neighbourhood of my left foot. My daughter, with face flushed and lips parted, was gazing feverishly down the road. An unheeded Thermos flask, held limply in her hand, was directing a stream of scalding tea down my leg. Before I could expostulate she wheeled round upon me, and I swear there were tears in her eyes.

“It’s _Bill_!” she shrieked. “Bill Bailey! _My_ Bill!”

She was right. As she spoke a black object appeared upon the crown of the hill, and, incredible to relate, Bill Bailey, puffing, snorting, reeking, jingling, back-firing, came lumbering down the slope, in his old hopeless but irresistible fashion, right upon our present encampment.

His lamps and Stepney wheel were gone, his back tyres were solid, and his erstwhile body of French-grey was now decked out in a rather blistered coat of that serviceable red pigment which adorns most of the farmers’ carts in the Highlands. But his voice was still unmistakably the voice of Bill Bailey.

He was driven by a dirty-faced youth in a blue overall, who presented the appearance of one who acts as general factotum in a country establishment which supports two or three motors and generates its own electric light. By his side sat a patriarchal old gentleman with a white beard, in tweeds, hobnail boots, and a deerstalker cap—obviously a head ghillie of high and ancient lineage.

The spider-seat at the back was occupied, in the fullest sense of the word, by a dead stag about the size of a horse, lashed to this, its temporary catafalque, with innumerable ropes.

The old gentleman was politeness itself, and on hearing of our plight placed himself and Bill Bailey unreservedly at our disposal. His master, The M‘Shin of Inversneishan, would be proud to house us for the night, and the game-car should convey us to the hospitable walls of Inversneishan forthwith. Tactfully worded doubts upon our part as to Bill’s carrying capacity—we did not complicate matters by explaining upon what good authority we spoke—were waved aside with a Highlander’s indifference to mere detail. The car was a grand car, and the Castle was no distance at all. Mr. Richards alone need be jettisoned. He could remain with The Greyhound all night, and on the morrow succour should be sent him.

Mr. Richards, utterly demoralised by his recent fall from the summit of autocracy, meekly assented, and presently Bill Bailey, packed like the last ’bus on a Saturday night, staggered off upon his homeward way. My wife and I shared the front seat with the oleaginous youth in the overall, while the patriarchal ghillie hung on precariously behind, locked in the embrace of the dead stag. How or where The Gruffin travelled I do not know. She may have perched herself upon some outlying portion of the stag, or she may have attached herself to Bill Bailey’s back-axle by her hair and sash, and been towed home. Anyhow, when, two hours later, Bill Bailey, swaying beneath his burden and roaring like a Bull of Bashan, drew up with all standing at the portals of Inversneishan Castle, it was The Gruffin who, unkempt, scarlet, but triumphant, rang the bell and bearded the butler while my wife and I uncoiled ourselves from intimate association with the chauffeur, the ghillie, and the stag.

Next morning, in returning thanks for the princely manner in which our involuntary host had entertained us, I retailed to him the full story of our previous acquaintance with Bill Bailey. I further added, with my daughter’s hot hand squeezing mine in passionate approval, an intimation that if ever Bill should again come into the market I thought I could find a purchaser for him.

He duly came back to us, at a cost of five pounds and his sea-passage, a few months later, and we have had him ever since.

Such is the tale of Bill Bailey. To-day he stands in a corner of my coach-house, an occupier of valuable space, a stumbling-block to all and sundry, and a lasting memorial to the omnipotence of human—especially feminine—sentiment.

Life-Like

_By_ Martin Swayne

_Royal Army Medical Corps_

Colonel Wedge was a quiet, genial bachelor. If there was anything that seemed to distinguish him from the familiar type of retired officer, it was his great breadth of shoulder. He was well over fifty, but still vigorous and active. On the day after his arrival in Paris, whither he had come on a week’s visit, he breakfasted at nine and spent the morning in visiting some public places of interest. He lunched at a restaurant near the Porte St. Martin, where he found himself in a typically Parisian atmosphere, and after smoking a cigar began to stroll idly along the streets. Chance directed his steps in a northerly direction, and about three in the afternoon he found himself in the Montmartre district.

He walked along in a casual manner, his hands clasped behind his back, watching everything with infinite relish. While passing up a side street his eye fell on a flamboyant advertisement outside a cinematograph show. The Colonel was not averse to cinematograph shows, and it struck him that here, perhaps, he might see something out of the ordinary. The poster was certainly lurid. It represented a man being attacked by snakes, and Wedge understood enough French to read the statement underneath that the representation was absolutely life-like, and that the death-agony was a masterpiece of acting.

“Rattlesnakes,” reflected the Colonel, eyeing the poster. “It’s wonderful what they do in the way of films nowadays. Of course, they’ve taken out the poison glands.”

He stood for a short time studying the poster, which was extremely realistic, and then decided to enter. He went up to the ticket-office, which stood on the pavement, and paid the entrance fee. It was obvious that the establishment was not of the first order. A couple of rickety wine-shops flanked it one on either side, and the ticket-office was apparently an old sentry-box with a hole cut in the back.

Wedge took his ticket and glanced up the street. It was a day of brilliant sunshine. At the far end of the narrow road there was a glimpse of the white domes of the Sacré Cœur, standing on its rising ground and looking like an Oriental palace. Only a few people were about, and the wine-shops were empty.

A shaft of sunlight fell on the poster of the man fighting with rattlesnakes, and the Colonel looked at it again. It attracted him in some mysterious way, probably because physical problems interested him.

“Seems to be in a kind of pit,” he thought. “Otherwise he could run for it. It is certainly life-like.”

He turned away, ticket in hand. A man standing before a faded plush curtain beckoned to him, and Wedge passed from the bright light of day into the darkness behind the curtain.

He could see nothing. Someone took his arm and led him forward. The Colonel blinked, but the darkness was complete. Somewhere on his left he could hear the familiar clicking of a cinematograph.

The hand on his arm piloted him gently along, and he had the impression of walking in a curve. But it seemed an intolerably long curve. Since he could not speak French, he was unable to ask how much farther he had to go. He felt vaguely that people were round him, close to him, and naturally concluded he was passing down the room where the performance was being held.

_But where was the screen?_

He could not see a ray of light. Heavy, impenetrable darkness was before him, and seemed to press on his eyelids like a cloth. Suddenly the hand on his arm was lifted. Wedge stopped, blinking.

“Look here,” he said, with a feeling of irritation, “where am I?”

There was no answer. He waited, listening. He could hear nothing. The clicking of the cinematograph was no longer audible.

Deeply perplexed, he held out his arms before him and took a step forward. His outstretched foot descended on—nothing.

Wedge fell forward and downwards with a sharp cry. His fall was brief, but it seemed endless to him. He landed, sprawling, on something soft. Before he could move he was caught and held down with his face pressed against the soft mass that felt like a heap of pillows. A suffocating, pungent odour assailed his nostrils, and gradually consciousness slipped away.

When Colonel Wedge came to his senses he found himself in a small room lit by an oil-lamp hung against the wall. He was lying on a heap of mattresses, bound hand and foot. At first he stared vaguely upwards. Directly overhead was a circular mark in the ceiling. The sound of voices struck on his ears, and, looking round, he saw a group of men talking at a table near by.

With startling suddenness memory came back. He glanced up at the ceiling. There was no doubt that the circular mark was the outline of the trap-door through which he had fallen. He did not attempt to struggle, but lay passively searching in his mind for some explanation of his position.

The men at the table were talking in loud voices, but they spoke in French. He could not understand what they said.

He looked round at them. Five of them—there were half a dozen—were roughly dressed, with blue or red handkerchiefs knotted round their throats; but one of them was of a different type, and looked like a prosperous business man. He was the spokesman and leader of the group, and Wedge noticed that he had a peculiarly evil, energetic type of face. He spoke rapidly, occasionally nodding towards the heap of mattresses and employing violent gestures. From time to time he thumped the table before him. Finally he rose and crossed the room.

“My name is Dance,” he said. He stuck the cigar he was smoking into the corner of his mouth and went on speaking between his teeth. “I’m an Englishman by birth, and wonderfully fond of my fellow-countrymen. That’s why you are here. You’re just the man I was wanting, and when I saw you looking at that poster I could have hugged myself. What did you think of it? Good, eh? Sorry you didn’t see the film.”

He chuckled to himself.

Wedge looked at him steadily and made no reply. The other shrugged his shoulders and turned away. Some further discussion followed, and then all six left the room.

Wedge waited until the sound of their footsteps had died away in the passage without, and then raised himself. Owing to the way in which he was bound he could not stand up. He looked around keenly. There was only one door and no window. The walls were of rough brick, and it was clear the place was a kind of cellar. Save for the table and chairs there was no furniture. The stone floor was damp, and from one dark corner Wedge could hear the trickling of water. After the first scrutiny of his prison he lay back again on the mattresses and tried to think. He could hear no sound of the traffic or footsteps from the road, and guessed that it would be useless to shout. Save for the trickle of water and the occasional hissing and spurting of the lamp, the place was absolutely silent.

The atmosphere was thick and close. The flame of the lamp grew smaller and smaller, and finally expired. Wedge lay in the darkness, open-eyed, listening to the beating of his heart. He was thirsty. His throat was dry and his head ached, and the cords round his wrists and feet bit into the flesh. He made several powerful attempts to burst them, but in vain.

For what purpose did they want him? If it was simply a question of robbery, why was he kept prisoner? An eternity seemed to pass. In despair, he tried to sleep. But the question as to why he was in this prison repeated itself and made sleep impossible.

Wedge was a man of tried courage, but there was something sinister in his position that caused disagreeable thrills to pass down his back. The trap-door, the chloroform, the cords, the group of evil-looking men were not reassuring incidents. Moreover, the isolation in complete darkness with the monotonous trickling of water unnerved him.

An hour went by, and he made another violent attempt to release himself. His breath came in gasps. Before his shut eyes he saw sheets of red flame. But his efforts were useless. Thoroughly exhausted he lay still again, staring upwards.

Owing to some trick of vision, possibly because the strong sunlight had intensified the colouring of the poster while he was studying it, he saw a shadowy picture of the man fighting for his life in the pit full of rattlesnakes hovering before him in the darkness. He thought grimly that it would be some time before he would have the pleasure of seeing the representation of that film—perhaps never. The latter event was more likely. It was not probable that they would let him go free, because his freedom would mean their arrest.

“They want me for some purpose,” he muttered. “But what it is, Heaven knows. It can’t be simple robbery. There’s no point in murdering me. I’m not a person of any importance, so I don’t see where the object of kidnapping comes in. Their game beats me, unless they’ve mistaken me for someone else.”

A step outside interrupted his reflections. He heard the door open. Something that sounded like a plate was put on the floor, and the steps retreated down the passage. After a few minutes they became audible again, and a light showed in the doorway. A man appeared holding a candle. Colonel Wedge realised that it was the intention of his captors that he should take some nourishment, and decided that to do so would be the wisest course. There was no reason why he should weaken himself by abstinence.

He submitted to being fed by his jailer, and eagerly drank the harsh red wine that was offered to him. When the meal was finished he was left alone again, but the candle was put on the table. By watching its rate of decrease in length Wedge gained some idea of the passage of time. By a calculation based on the number of his heart-beats, which were normally sixty to the minute, he deduced that the candle would last for about four hours. As a matter of fact, Wedge’s deduction was wrong. The candle burned for three hours. Wedge was unaware that his heart was beating eighty to the minute.

Months seemed to elapse before the candle shot up in a last flare. The Colonel stared at the walls, at the rough, unfaced bricks, at the trap-door in the ceiling. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep. He sat up at intervals and looked round him. He rolled from one side to another. But nothing helped to make the time pass more quickly, and when he was left again in darkness he felt for the first time in his life how easy it would be to go mad.

The tramp of feet roused him from a drowsy, half-conscious condition. The door was flung open and a lantern shone in Wedge’s eyes. The men who had sat at the table had returned. Two of them cut the cords round his ankles and pulled him on to his feet. He stood with difficulty, for his legs were numb.

The man Dance, who had previously spoken to him, whose evil face had made an impression on the Colonel’s mind, sat down at the table, and Wedge was placed before him.

“Speak no French?” he inquired.

“No.”

The man nodded, and played with a thick gold ring on one of his fingers. His eyes were fixed on the Colonel’s face.

“What am I here for?” asked Wedge, quietly.

“You’ll see soon.”

“Do you want my money?”

“We’ve taken that already.”

They looked at each other steadily. The others in the cellar shuffled uneasily. They did not seem to be so certain of themselves as the man at the table.

“You’re an English officer, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ve seen some fighting?”

The Colonel shrugged his shoulders and said nothing. He refused to submit to a cross-examination at the hands of this scoundrel.

“All right,” said the other. “Don’t get angry. I promise you that you’ll see some more fighting before you die.”

Something in the man’s expression made Wedge take a quick step towards the table.

“What do you mean? Are you going to kill me?”

There was no answer, but the silence was enough. Wedge relaxed his attitude slowly.

“Is it money you need?” he asked, after a pause.

“What’s the good of offering us money? Once you got out of this place, you would give us away to the police. Yes, we need money, but not from you.”

One thought dominated Wedge’s mind. It was clear that the situation did not demand any unnecessary heroism. If anything could effect his escape he was perfectly justified in making use of it.

“I will give you a thousand pounds, and will promise not to put the affair in the hands of the police,” he said.

“He offers money, and gives his word of honour to say nothing to the police!” exclaimed the other, looking at the men behind Wedge.

There was an outburst of violent opposition. They were wildly excited. They were all round Wedge, shouting and gesticulating and brandishing their fists in his face. He stood impassively in the centre of them with his hands bound. What was this riot? Why did the eyes of these men shine so strangely?

“Two thousand,” he said steadily.

“Impossible!” The man at the table jumped up. “This is only a waste of time.”

He caught up the lantern and went out. The others, pushing Wedge before them, followed. They passed through a long stone corridor, down some narrow steps, and stopped before an iron door. Wedge heard the fumbling of keys, the creak of a rusty lock, and the door swung open. The interior was dark.

Dance stood by the door, holding the lantern aloft. In obedience to a brief command Wedge’s hands were released.

“Hand him the club.”

A stout cudgel of twisted wood, with a heavy nobbed end, was thrust into his hands. But Wedge was a man of action, and he saw in a flash that if he was to escape from his unknown fate the opportunity had come. They were trying to push him through the door into the dark interior.

“_Vite! Il est dangereux!_” exclaimed the man with the lantern.

But Wedge was too quick. He swung the club swiftly round, and the lantern fell, smashed to atoms. In a moment he was seized by half a dozen hands. He fought powerfully, but they hung on to him grimly, and little by little he was thrust forward. He had not enough space to use the club. He dropped it and used his fists, and more than once struck the stone walls in the confusion of the struggle in the dark. Then someone got hold of his throat, while the others fastened on his arms, and he was thrown backwards. He heard the clang of the iron door and lay gasping on the floor.

A blinding white light suddenly shone down on him. He staggered to his feet and looked round, shading his eyes with his hands from the dazzling glare. He was in a circular space bounded by smooth white walls. The floor was sanded. Above him burned half a dozen arc-lamps, whose brilliant rays were reflected directly downwards by polished metal discs. The upper part of the place was in shadow, but he could make out an iron balcony running partly round the wall, about fifteen feet above the sanded floor.

Colonel Wedge went to the wall and began to examine its surface. It was smooth, and seemed made of painted iron. The outline of the door through which he had been flung was visible on one side, but directly opposite there was the outline of another door. He went towards it. It was also made of iron like the surrounding structure, and apparently opened outwards. He pushed at it, but it was shut.

A sound of something falling on the floor made him turn. The wooden cudgel had been thrown down from the iron platform above. Looking up, he could dimly see a number of faces staring down at him, and also a couple of box-like instruments, one at either end of the platform. It was difficult to see clearly, for the light of the arc-lamps was intense. He stared up, shielding his eyes, and then suddenly he saw what they were. A couple of cinematograph machines were trained on the floor below!

It was not until then that Wedge fully realised his position. The picture of the man fighting the rattlesnakes was suddenly explained. He remembered the pit. He walked to the centre and stood with clenched fists. Here was the pit. _Extremely life-like!_

He stooped and picked up the cudgel. At any rate, whatever he had to face, he would make a fight for it.

Mechanically he found himself watching the second door. It was through that door that the menace of death would come.

Up on the platform they were whispering together.

His brain was clear, and he felt calm. He knew that whatever came out from behind that door would have the intention to kill. And he knew, also, that it was not the wish of the onlookers that he should triumph. It would not be a fair fight. In the moments of suspense he wondered in a kind of deliberate, leisurely way what was coming. They would not repeat the rattlesnake picture. That had already had its victim. In this arena one man had acted the part of fear with marvellous realism—perhaps others as well.

Cudgel in hand, ready and braced, with his free hand at his moustache, Colonel Wedge waited, his eyes fixed on the door.

“Ah, I think you understand now,” said a voice out of the shadows above. “We hope that this will make a fine film, the finest of this series that we have done yet.”

Wedge did not move a muscle.

“We rely on you to do your best for us.”

Somewhere at the bottom of his heart the Colonel registered a vow that if he ever got out of that place alive he would kill Dance.

A chuckle followed and then silence, except for the sizzling of the arc-lamps.

Then he heard a sound of clicking. The cinematograph machines had begun.

“Ready?”

Wedge took his breath slowly. The door was opening.

He saw a gap of blackness widening in the white circular wall. The hand that was at his moustache fell to his side. The cudgel rose a trifle, and the muscles of his right arm stiffened. Inch by inch, without a creak, the door swung outwards until it stood widely open.

For a few seconds nothing appeared. The suspense was becoming unendurable, and Wedge had just made up his mind to approach when he saw an indistinct form moving in the background of the shadowy interior, and next moment a big yellow beast slipped out and stood blinking in the strong light. He recognised the flat diamond head and tufted ears in a moment. The door clanged behind it.

“Puma,” he muttered, with his eyes on the brute, and a spark of hope glowed in his heart. There were worse brutes to face single-handed than pumas, and he knew something of the capriciousness of the animal. It was just possible——

His thoughts ceased abruptly. The beast was moving. It slunk on its belly to the wall, and began to walk slowly round and round. Wedge, turning as it moved, always faced it. It quickened its pace into a trot, and as it ran it looked only occasionally at the man in the centre. It seemed more interested in the wall. At times it stretched its head and peered upwards.

In its lean white jaw and yellow eyes there was no message of hatred for the moment. Suddenly it stopped and listened. The clicking of the cinematograph had attracted it. It stood up against the wall, clawing at the paint. Then it squatted on its haunches, with its back to Wedge, and blinked up at the platform overhead.

The heavy fetid odour of the beast filled the air. Wedge relaxed himself a little, but the puma heard the movement, for it looked round swiftly. It behaved as if it had seen him for the first time, and began to pace round and round again, eyeing him. It came to a halt near the door from which it had emerged, and lay down flat, with its paws outstretched, watching Wedge. He caught the sheen of its eyes. He remained still, for at the slightest movement the brute quivered.

As yet he could read nothing vindictive in its look, but he knew that at any moment it might change into a raging, snarling demon and spring. Being a believer in the idea that animals are in some way conscious of the emotional state in others and act accordingly, he tried to banish all sense of fear and all sense of ill-will from his mind, and look at it calmly and indifferently.

The puma, with its fore-paws extended on the sand and its head raised, blinked lazily at him. It seemed half asleep by its attitude. Sometimes the brilliant eyes were almost shut.

“Mordieu!” said a voice above. “He wants rousing.”

In a flash the animal was on its feet, rigid and glaring up. Apparently the platform overhead roused its anger. Its tail began to whip from side to side, and its lip lifted at one corner in a vicious snarl, uncovering the white fang.

A clamour of voices broke out. The whole aspect of the beast changed. Its eyes blazed. It stooped on its belly, glaring upwards. Was it possible it recognised an old enemy amongst the spectators?

Wedge waited anxiously, and the sweat began to break out on his brow.

With bared claws, the animal crouched, still looking upwards. It seemed to have forgotten Wedge. The men were shouting at it and stamping with their feet on the iron floor of the platform. The beast put one paw out and crept forward. The muscles rippled and bulged under the skin.

“It’s going to spring,” thought Wedge. “But it’s not looking at me.”

Slowly step by step the beast advanced. It passed scarcely two feet away from Wedge, and went on without looking at him. When it was almost directly under the platform it stopped and snarled upwards.

Then someone threw a lighted match on its back, and straightway it became transformed into the devil-cat of tradition.

Wedge was never quite clear as to its movements after that, for it flashed round the arena like a streak of yellow lightning He raised his club, but the brute was not after him. It went twice, and then a third time, round the white walls, and stopped for an instant, taut and low on the sandy floor. And then it shot up in a magnificent leap towards the shadows above the arc-lamps.

The shouts from the platform ceased suddenly, and then a wild hubbub broke out.

Wedge heard the rattling and scraping of the beast’s claws against the railings above and a shriek of terror. There was a stampede of feet. A loud series of snarls followed and the sound of a body falling heavily.

Wedge stood for a moment dazed. Then he dashed across to the door through which the beast had entered, and flung all his weight against it. He tried again and again with all the weight of his powerful shoulders. It yielded with a crash, and he fell flat into the cage on the other side, amongst the foul straw.

He was up in an instant. By the light of the arc-lamps in the arena he could make out that the cage had an iron grating on one side closed by a bolt. He thrust his hand through the bars and worked back the bolt. Next moment he was out of the cage and running down a dark stone corridor, cudgel in hand, and determined to brain anyone who stood in his path. At the top of a flight of steps he came to a door barred from the inside. He flung aside the fastenings and staggered out into the sweet night air.

When the police raided the cellars under the cinematograph show a few hours later, led by Wedge, they found the puma asleep in its open cage, and above, on the iron platform, all that was left of Mr. Dance, inventor and producer of life-like films.

It was not until daylight came that Wedge discovered they had blackened his eyebrows and drawn disfiguring lines across his face.

Lame Dogs

_By_ Cosmo Hamilton

_Royal Naval Air Service_

The sun fell straightly upon a great golden cornfield. Already the sickle had been at work upon its edges, and tall bundles, among whose feet the vermilion poppy peeped, stood head-to-head at regular distances. Among the ripe heads of the uncut corn the intermittent puffs of a soft August breeze whispered, offering congratulations and perhaps condolences—congratulations mostly, because what is there more beautiful and right in all the year’s usefulness than the glorious fulfilment of the spring’s green promise?

All the hours of a busy morning had been marked off melodiously by the old clock of an older church which stood with maternal dignity among gravestones several fields away. It wanted only a few moments to the hour of one. A brawny son of the soil, tanned of face, neck, and arms, who had been working in the angle of the field nearest the road, had just laid down his sickle and his crooked stick.

He was hot, but satisfied. He was also sharp-set, and very ready for the dinner that awaited him, with beer, at his cottage on the outskirts of the village. He sang, quietly and monotonously, in a typical burring way, a song which was written in praise of boiled beef and carrots. And while he sang he dabbed his face and neck with a startling handkerchief of red and yellow.

Swallows, flying high, skimmed the air playfully. Flocks of sparrows moved quickly among the standing corn, no longer frightened by the tin with stones in it, that was rattled by a slow-footed boy in the distance. They were eager to get their fill of stolen fruits before their natural enemies removed it from their beaks. The air was alive with the glimmering heat, and the shadows of the trees were almost straight.

One sounded, and before the bell’s reverberations had blown away, a note of discord in the delicious harmony was struck by the sudden appearance of a man, who leaned on the white gate which divided the field from the road.

He was a short, slight, odd-looking creature, dressed in clothes that were rather too smart, and a green dump hat a little the worse for wear. His clean-shaven face, mobile and curiously lined, was pale and a little pinched, and the whole limp appearance of the man showed that he was only just recovering from an illness. Across one shoulder a knapsack was slung, and behind his left ear there rested a cigarette. A pearl was stuck in a rather loud tie, and there was a large ring on one of his little fingers.

There was something both comic and pathetic In the figure, and everything that was peculiarly the very antithesis of the exquisite rural surroundings. The initials “R. D.” were stencilled on the knapsack, and they stood for Richard Danby, a name that was well known in towns, but wholly unknown among cornfields and under the blue, unsmoked sky.

Danby, who had gladly leaned on the gate to rest, watched the big, muscular man for a moment, with eyes in which there was admiration, and listened to the unmusical rendering of a song which had trickled, note by note, into the country from London, with amusement. He then adopted an air of forced cheerfulness and clapped his hands.

“Bravo!” he said. “Bravo!”

Peter Pippard turned slowly, antagonistically.

“Eh?” he said.

The little man waved his ringed hand.

“I said ’Bravo’—well rendered. What is it? An aria from _Faust_, or a little thing of your own?”

The big man was puzzled and surprised.

“Eh?” he said again.

Danby was not to be beaten. There was something in his manner which showed that he was in the habit of addressing himself to audiences and talking for effect.

“How delightful,” he continued, with fluent insincerity, “to find a peasant in song! A merry heart wags all the day. Who wouldn’t be happy among the golden corn, in touch with Nature, with the field-bugs gambolling over one’s back!”

“Eh?”

Danby laughed.

“You find me a little flowery; I am flying too high for you. I am indulging in aeroplanics. I’ll come down to the good red earth. Marnin’, matey. How’s t’crops?”

The imitation of the country accent was ridiculously exaggerated. The farm-hand examined the town man searchingly and suspiciously.

“Eh?” he said again.

“Beat again!” said Danby, with a shriek of laughter.

Pippard went closer, but slowly.

“Want onythin’, mister?” he asked.

“No. Oh Lord, no! I only want to get some other word out of you than ‘eh.’”

“Oh,” said Pippard.

“Thanks. Thanks most awfully. Now we’re moving.... Well, how’s the corn? It looks fine and fat.”

“Ah,” said Pippard, grinning broadly and affectionately.

The little man bowed. He seemed to be saying things which would arouse laughter among an invisible audience.

“Again I thank you. Yes, very fine and fat. You’ve been punching out and giving them thick ears. What?”

The examination was continued.

“You doan’t seem ter be talkin’ sense, mister.”

Another shriek of laughter disturbed the characteristic peacefulness.

“Congratulations! You’ve discovered me. How can I talk sense when I’m trying to be sociable? You don’t object to a little bright conversation, do you?”

“Noa.”

“Well, we’ll cut generalities and come to facts. How’s the twins?”

“Ain’t got no twins.”

“Nonsense! I don’t believe it. A great, big, brawny fellow like you. I take it you’ve got some nippers?”

Pippard chuckled. “Three girls and two boys.”

“Ah, that’s something like! Again congratulations! It’s very kind of you to ask me to come over. Since you’re so pressing, I think I will.” He climbed over the gate a little painfully and walked jauntily into the field.

The farm-hand broke into a laugh. “Ah reckon as ’ow you’re a funny man, ain’t you?”

The little man became suddenly serious, so suddenly and so eagerly serious, that if Pippard had been endowed with the first glimmerings of psychology, he would have been startled and a little nervous. “Are you joking, or do you mean it? Is it possible that I make you laugh? Is it possible?”

“The very sight o’ you gives me a ticklin’ inside,” was the reply.

Danby seized the brawny and surprised hand and wrung it warmly. “God bless you, dear old Hodge!” he said hoarsely. “God bless you!” Then he laughed merrily. “You make me feel like an attack of bronchitis.”

The feeble joke went home. Pippard roared. “There you goes agin,” he said. “What _are_ yer, mister? A hartist?”

“An artist? Oh, dear no. Oh, God bless me, no! I’m an artiste.”

“What’s the difference, any’ow?”

If the little man had asked for his cue, he could not have got it more readily. “An artist earns his bread-and-butter by putting paint on canvas, and an artiste gets an occasional dish of tripe and onions by putting paint on his face.”

“Ah reckon as ’ow you’re an artiste, mister, although Ah can’t see no paint on yer face.”

“I washed over twelve months ago,” said Danby sadly. “Oh, by the way, am I trespassing?”

“Well, it all depends on wot ye’re a-goin’ ter do.”

“Eat, old boy. If you’ve no objection I’m going to spread out my _hors d’œuvres_ and _pâté de foie gras_, and lunch al-fresco.”

“Don’t onderstand a blame wurd,” said Pippard, grinning.

“Putting it in plain English, I’m going to wrestle with half a loaf of bread and two slices of cold ham. Will you join me? Do.” The invitation was made eagerly. “Stay here and let me hear you laugh. It does me more good than a whole side of streaky bacon.”

Pippard scratched his head doubtfully. “Well, Ah told th’ old ’ooman as ’ow Ah’d be wome for dinner,” he said.

“The old woman must not be disappointed. Do you pass a pub on your way home?”

“Can’t go anywhere from ’ere without passin’ a poob.”

Danby squeezed a shilling into the great sun-tanned fist.

“Well, call in and get a drink.”

“Thankee, Ah doan’t mind if Ah do.”

“Drink to my health. I don’t suppose you want a drink more than I want health.” He walked round the farm-labourer admiringly. He looked like a smooth-haired terrier who had suddenly met a St. Bernard. “My word, I’d give something to be a man like you. What muscle, what bones, what a back! What a hand! It’s as big as a leg of mutton. Do you ever get tired of being healthy? Do you ever wake up in the morning and say: ‘O Lord, I’m still as strong as an ox—why can’t I get a nice thumping headache to keep me in bed?’”

It was altogether too much for the man who rose with the sun and went to bed with the sun and worked out in the fields all day long; the big, simple, healthy, natural man, whose life was a series of seasons, to whom there was no tragedy except bad weather, and a lack of work and wages. This odd little creature, who said unexpected things as though he meant them, and asked funny questions seriously, was “a comic”—such a man as the clown who came with the circus twice a year, and played the fool in the big tent which was pitched on the green and lighted with flares of gas. Pippard laughed so loudly that he scared the eager sparrows.

“There you go,” he said. “Ah reckon as ’ow you was born funny.”

Danby eyed him keenly and wistfully. “Are you laughing at me?” he asked. “_Me?_”

“Laffin’? Why, you’d make an old sow laff.”

“You amaze me,” said Danby. He gave the man another shilling. “Get further drinks on your way back. You’re—you’re a pink pill for pale people, old boy.”

“Ah _must_ go,” said Pippard reluctantly.

“Yes, you trudge off to the old woman and get your dinner. I’ll drink your health in a glass of water and a tabloid.”

Pippard got into his coat and re-lit a short black clay.

“Well, good day, and thankee.”

“Good day, and thank _you_.” Danby held out his hand. It was thin and pale. It was grasped and shaken monstrously. “That’s right—hurt it. Go on; hurt it. You make me feel almost manly.... Good day and good luck! My love to the old woman and the kids, and the rabbit, and the old dog, and granny.”

Laughing again, the big man marched off, made small work of the gate, and trudged away. Danby followed him up to the gate, and stood watching him curiously and admiringly, and as he watched he spoke his thoughts aloud.

“Good day, giant,” he said. “Good day, simple son of the soil, who eats hearty, drinks like a fish, and digests everything. Good-bye, man who knows nothing, and doesn’t want to know anything. I’d give ten years of my life for five of yours any day. Well, well.”

He turned with a sigh, took off his hat and hung it on a twig of the hedge, and then divested himself of his knapsack. This he unstrapped, and, taking out a napkin, spread it with a certain neatness on the grass, and set upon it a loaf, a piece of Cheddar cheese, a lettuce, and several slices of ham wrapped in paper, a knife and fork. To this not unappetising meal he added a large green bottle of water.

“Ah!” he said. A sudden thought struck him. He put his finger and thumb into a waistcoat pocket, and brought out a small bottle of tabloids. He swallowed one with many grimaces and much effort. He sighed again and sat down. He looked with feigned interest at the eatables in front of him for several minutes. He then shook his head and gave an expressive gesture. “No,” he said aloud, in order that he might not feel quite so lonely. “No, not hungry. Beautiful food, clean napkin, lettuce washed in the brook, no appetite—not one faint semblance of a twist!”

It appeared from the startled flight of a thrush from the hedge that R. D. was not to be lonely after all. Another person bent over the gate, and looked into the cornfield, seemed perfectly satisfied, and climbed over. “This is all right,” she said. “Carlton, S.W. Oh!”

The exclamation was involuntary. The girl caught sight of the man and pulled up short.

Danby sprang to his feet. The girl was pretty; and although her once smart clothes were shabby, and her shoes very much the worse for wear, she looked a nice, honest, frank creature, aglow with health and youth and optimism. Danby caught up his hat, put it on, and took it off again in his best society manner.

“No intrusion,” he said. “Just a little al-fresco lunch, nothing more.”

The girl smiled. Her teeth were very small and white and regular. “That was my idea,” she said. “Not in the way, I hope?”

“Oh, please,” replied Danby. “The sight of some one eating may inspire me and give me the much-desired appetite.”

A ringing laugh was caught up by the gentle breeze.

“I should like to be able to eat enough to starve mine. Good morning!”

“Good morning!” said Danby. He bowed again, and hung his hat back on the twig. He was not a little disappointed. He had hoped for conversation and companionship. He sat down, but with interested eyes watched the girl unpack her luncheon quickly and deftly. She had no napkin. She spread her bread and meat on a sheet of newspaper, and cleaned her knife by thrusting it into the earth and wiping it on the grass. He noticed that her shoes were very dusty, and came to the conclusion that she had walked some distance. He was right. He caught her eye and looked away quickly.

“I beg pardon!” he said.

“Granted, I’m sure.” Danby’s manners were excellent.

“You haven’t got such a thing as a pinch of salt, I suppose?”

“I can oblige you with all the condiments, including a little A1 sauce.”

The girl laughed again. It was a charming laugh. “Oh, I can do without that,” she said.

Danby, only too glad of an excuse to be of use, scrambled to his feet and made his way across the golden stubble to the girl’s side. In his hand he held a small tobacco-tin. He opened it and held it out.

“Navy-cut?” she said, with wide-eyed surprise.

“An old ‘Dreadnought’ turned into a merchant ship. It’s quite clean.”

“Oh, thanks most awfully!” She helped herself to salt.

“Not at all,” said Danby. “Any little thing like that.... Good day!”

“Good day!” she said.

But Danby did not move. The girl’s kind heart was reflected in her blue eyes. Never in his life had he needed sympathy and companionship so desperately. He felt that even his long-lost appetite would return if she were to invite him to eat with her.

She too was lonely, although her indomitable courage did not permit her to own it, even to herself. There was, too, something about the little man that was very attractive, something which made her feel sorry for him. She wished that he would ask her if he might join her and bring his own food. What was it about him which reminded her of some one she had seen before?

“Rather nice here, isn’t it?” she said.

He replied quickly, eagerly.

“Charming!” he said. “So sylvan.”

“So whater?”

“Sylvan. French for rustic.”

“Oh, French!”

“Yes; I beg your pardon.”

“Good day!” she said.

“Good day!” he replied.

He returned reluctantly to his pitch. He felt that he deserved his dismissal. It was a very foolish thing to have shown that he was something of a scholar. Evidently she considered that he was putting on side.

He sat down and made a sandwich. He felt that he could eat it with some enjoyment if he were seated on the other side of her square of newspaper. As it was....

The girl gave a short laugh.

“I’m afraid I’m a great nuisance,” she began apologetically.

“Not at all. Far from it.” There was another chance, then.

“You haven’t got such a thing as a touch of mustard, I suppose?”

“Oh yes, I have. Almost quite fresh.”

He got up again, and carried a little cold-cream pot with him.

“Oh, thank you!” She took the pot and gazed at its label, with raised eyebrows.

“It’s a has-been,” he said hastily. “I’m a bit of an engineer. Everything comes in useful.”