Complete Works of R S Surtees

by R S Surtees

  “O that Skinner’s a bad un,” gasped Mrs. Margerum, “always said he was a mischievous, dangerous man; but I’ll have satisfaction of both him and old Nosey,” continued she, “or I’ll know the reason why.”

  The particulars of the catastrophe being at length related (at least as far as it suited Mrs. Margerum to tell it), the kettle was presently put on the renewed fire, a round table produced, and the usual consolation of the black bottle resorted to. Then as the party sat sipping their grog, a council of war was held as to the best course of proceeding. Lawyer Hindmarch was better versed in the law of landlord and tenant — the best way of a tenant doing his landlord, — than in the more recondite doctrine of master and servant, particularly the delicate part relating to perquisites; and though he thought Sir Moses had done wrong in beating the boy, he was not quite sure but there might be something in the boy being found about the house at an unseasonable hour of the night. Moreover, as farming times were getting dull, and the lawyer was meditating a slope à la Henerey Brown & Co.? he did not wish to get mixed up in a case that might bring him in collision with Sir Moses or his agent, so he readily adopted Mrs. Margerum’s suggestion of going to consult Mr. George Gallon. He really thought Mr. Gallon would be the very man for her to see. Geordey was up to everything, and knew nicely what people could stand by, and what they could not; and lawyer Hindmarch was only sorry his old grey gig-mare was lame, or he would have driven her up to George’s at once. However, there was plenty of time to get there on foot before morning, and they would take care of Anthony Thom till she came back, only she must be good enough not to return till nightfall; for that nasty suspicious Nathan was always prowling about, and would like nothing better than to get him into mischief with Sir Moses. — And that point being settled, they replenished their glasses, and drank success to the mission; and having seen the belaboured Anthony Thom safe in a shakedown, Mrs. Margerum borrowed Mrs. Hindmarch’s second best bonnet, a frilled and beaded black velvet one with an ostrich feather, and her polka jacket, and set off on foot for the Rose and Crown beer-shop, being escorted to their door by her host and hostess, who assured her it wouldn’t be so dark when she got away from the house a bit.

  And that point being accomplished, lawyer and Mrs. Hindmarch retired to rest, wishing they were as well rid of Anthony Thom, whom they made no doubt had got into a sad scrape, in which they wished they mightn’t be involved.

  A sluggish winter’s day was just dragging its lazy self into existence as Mrs. Margerum came within sight of Mr. Gallon’s red-topped roof at the four lane ends, from whose dumpy chimney the circling curl of a wood fire was just emerging upon the pure air. As she got nearer, the early-stirring Mr. Gallon himself crossed the road to the stable, attired in the baggy velveteen shooting-jacket of low with the white cords and shining pork-butcher’s top-boots of high life. Mr. Gallon was going to feed Tippy Tom before setting off for the great open champion coursing meeting to be held on Spankerley Downs, “by the kind permission of Sir Harry Fuzball, Baronet,” it being one of the peculiar features of the day that gentlemen who object to having their game killed in detail, will submit to its going wholesale, provided it is done with a suitable panegyrick. “By the kind permission of Sir Harry Fuzball, Baronet,” or “by leave of the lord of the manor of Flatshire,” and so on; and thus every idler who can’t keep himself is encouraged to keep a greyhound, to the detriment of a nice lady-like amusement, and the encouragement of gambling and poaching.

  Mr. Gallon was to be field steward of this great open champion meeting, and had been up betimes, polishing off Tippy Tom; which having done, he next paid a similar compliment to his own person; and now again was going to feed the flash high-stepping screw, ere he commenced with his breakfast.

  Mrs. Margerum’s “hie Mr. Gallon, hie!” and up-raised hand, as she hurried down the hill towards his house, arrested his progress as he passed to the stable with the sieve, and he now stood biting the oats, and eyeing her approach with the foreboding of mischief that so seldom deceives one.

  “O Mr. Gallon! O Mr. Gallon!” cried Mrs. Margerum, tottering up, and dropping her feathered head on his brawny shoulder.

  “What’s oop? What’s oop?” eagerly demanded our sportsman, fearing for his fair character.

  “O Mr. Gallon! such mischief! such mischief!”

  “Speak, woman! speak!” demanded our publican; “say, has he cotched ye?”

  “Yes, Gerge, yes,” sobbed Mrs. Margerum, bursting into tears. “To devil he has!” exclaimed Mr. Gallon, stamping furiously with his right foot, “Coom into it hoose, woman; coom into it boose, and tell us’arl aboot it.” So saying, forgetting Tippy Toni’s wants, he retraced his steps with the corn, and flung frantically into the kitchen of his little two-roomed cottage.

  “Here, lassie!” cried he, to a little girl, who was frying a dish of bubble-and-squeak at the fire. “Here, lassie, set doon it pan loike, aud tak this corn to it huss, and stand by while it eats it so saying he handed her the sieve, and following her to the door, closed it upon her.

  “Noo,” said he to Mrs. Margerum, “sit doon and tell us arl aboot it. Who cotched ye? Nosey, or who?”

  “0 it wasn’t me! It was Anthony Thom they caught, and they used him most shemful; but I’ll have him tried for his life ofore my Lord Size, and transported, if it costs me all I’m worth in the world.”

  “Anthony Thom was it?” rejoined Mr. Gallon, raising his great eye-brows, and staring wide his saucer eyes, “Anthony Thom was it? but he’d ha’ nothin’ upon oi ‘ope?”

  “Nothin’, Gerge,” replied Mrs. Margerum, “nothin’ — less now it might just appen to be an old rag of a night-eap of that nasty, covetous body Cuddy Flintoff; but whether it had a mark upon it or not I really can’t say.”

  “O dear, but that’s a bad job,” rejoined Mr. Gallon, biting his lips and shaking his great bull-head; “O dear, but that’s a bad job. you know I always chairged ye to be careful ‘boot unlawful goods.”

  “You did, Gerge! you did!” sighed Mrs. Margerum; “and if this old rag had a mark, it was a clear oversight. But, O dear!” continued she, bursting into tears, “how they did beat my Anthony Thom!” With this relief she became more composed, and proceeded to disclose all the particulars.

  “Ah, this ‘ill be a trick of those nasty pollis fellers,” observed Mr. Gallon thoughtfully, “oi know’d they’d be the ruin o’ trade as soon as ever they came into it country loike — nasty pokin’, pryin’, mischievous fellers. Hoosomiver it mun be seen to, aud that quickly,” continued he. “for it would damage me desp’rate on the Torf to have ony disturbance o’ this sorrt, and we mun stop it if we can.

  “Here, lassie!” cried he to the little girl who had now returned from the stable, “lay cloth i’ next room foike, and then finish the fryin’; and oi’ll tell ve what,” continued he, laying his huge hand on Mrs. Margerum’s shoulder, “oi’ve got to go to it champion cooursin’ meetin’, so I’ll just put it hus into harness and droive ye round by it Bird-i’-the-Bush, where we’ll find Carroty Kebbel, who’ll tell us what te do, for oi don’t like the noight-cap business some hoo,” so saying Mr. Gallon took his silver plated harness down from its peg in the kitchen, and proceeded to caparison Tippy Tom, while the little girl, now assisted by Mrs. Margerum, prepared the breakfast, and set it on the table. Rather a sumptuous repast they had, considering it was only a way-side beer-shop; bubble-and-squeak, reindeer-tongue, potted game, potted shrimps, and tea strikingly like some of Sir Moses’s. The whole being surmounted with a glass a-piece of pure British gin, Mr. Gallon finished his toilette, and then left to put the high-stepping screw into the light spring-cart, while Mrs. Margerum reviewed her visage in the glass, and as the openworks clock in the kitchen struck nine, they were dashing down the Heatherbell-road at the rate of twelve miles an hour.

  CHAPTER LX. MR. CARROTY KEBBEL.

  MR. CARROTY KEBBEL was a huge red-haired, Crimean-bearded, peripatetic attorney, who travelled from petty sessions to petty s
essions, spending his intermediate time at the public houses, ferreting out and getting up cases. He was a roistering ruffian, who contradicted everybody, denied everything, and tried to get rid of what he couldn’t answer with a horse-laugh. He was in good practice, for he allowed the police a liberal per-centage for bringing him prosecutions, while his bellowing bullying insured him plenty of defences on his own account. He was retained by half the ragamuffins in the country. He had long been what Mr. Gallon not inaptly called his “liar,” and had done him such good service as to earn free quarters at the Rose and Crown whenever he liked to call. He had been there only the day before, in the matter of an alibi he was getting up for our old hare-finding friend Springer, who was most unhandsomely accused of night-poaching in Lord Oilcake’s preserves, and that was how Mr. Gallon knew where to find him. The Crumpletin railway had opened out a fine consecutive line of petty sessions, out of which Carrots had carved a “home circuit” of his own. He was then on his return tour.

  With the sprightly exertions of Tippy Tom, Gallon and Mrs. Margerum were soon within sight of the Bird-in-the-Bush Inn, at which Gallon drew up with a dash. Carrots, however, had left some half-hour before, taking the road for Farningford, where the petty sessions were about to be held; and though this was somewhat out of Gallon’s way to Spankerley Downs, yet the urgency of the case determined him to press on in pursuit, and try to see Carrots. Tippy Tom, still full of running, went away again like a shot, and bowling through Kimberley toll-bar with the air of a man who was free, Gallon struck down the Roughfield road to the left, availing himself of the slight fall of the ground to make the cart run away with the horse, as it were, and so help him up the opposing hill. That risen, they then got upon level ground; and, after bowling along for about a mile or so, were presently cheered with the sight of the black wide-awake crowned lawyer striding away in the distance.

  Carrots was a disciple of the great Sir Charles Napier, who said that a change of linen, a bit of soap, and a comb were kit enough for any one; and being only a two-shirts-a-week man, he generally left his “other” one at such locality as he was likely to reach about the middle of it, so as to apportion the work equally between them. This was clean-shirt day with him, and he was displaying his linen in the ostentatious way of a man little accustomed to the luxury. With the exception of a lavender-and-white coloured watch-ribbon tie, he was dressed in a complete suit of black-grounded tweed, with the purple dots of an incipient rash, the coat having capacious outside pockets, and the trousers being now turned np at the bottoms to avoid the mud; “showing” rhinoceros hide-like shoes covering most formidable-looking feet. Such was the monster who was now swinging along the highway at the rate of five miles an hour, in the full vigour of manhood, and the pride of the morning. At the sight of him in advance, Mr. Gallon just touched Tippy Tom with the point of the whip, which the animal resented with a dash at the collar and a shake of the head, that as good as said, “You’d better not do that again, master, unless you wish to take your vehicle home in a sack.” Mr. Gallon therefore refrained, enlisting the aid of his voice instead, and after a series of those slangey-whiney yaah-hoo! yaah-hoo’s! that the swell-stage-coachmen, as they called the Snobs, used to indulge in to clear the road or attract attention, Mr. Gallon broke out into a good downright “Holloa, Mr. Kebbel! Holloa!”

  At the sound of his name, Carrots, who was spouting his usual exculpatory speech, vowing he felt certain no bench of Justices would convict on such evidence, and so on, pulled up; and Mr. Gallon, waving his whip over his head, he faced about, and sat down on a milestone to wait his coming. The vehicle was presently alongside of him.

  “Holloa, George!” exclaimed Carrots, rising and shaking hands with his client. “Holloa! What’s up? Who’s this you’ve got?” looking intently at Mrs. Margerum.

  “I’ll tell you,” said George, easing the now quivering-tailed Tippy Tom’s head; “this is Mrs. Margerum you’ve heard me speak ‘boot; and she’s loike to get into a little trooble loike; and I tell’d her she’d best see a ‘liar’ as soon as she could.”

  “Just so,” nodded Kebbel, anticipating what had happened. “You see,” continued Mr. Gallon, winding his whip thong round the stick as he spoke “in packing up some little bit things in a hurry loike, she put up a noight cap, and she’s not quoite sure whether she can stand by it or not, ye know.”

  “I see,” assented Carrots; “and they’ve got it, I ‘spose?”

  “I don’t know that they got it,” now interposed Mrs. Margerum; “but they got my Anthony Thom, and beat him most shameful. Can’t I have redress for my Anthony Thom?”

  “We’ll see,” said Carrots, resuming his seat on the milestone, and proceeding to elicit all particulars, beginning with the usual important inquiry, whether Anthony Thom had said anything or not. Finding he had not, Carrots took courage, and seemed inclined to make light of the matter. “The groceries you bought, of course,” said he, “of Roger Rounding the basket-man — Roger will swear anything for me; and as for the night-cap, why say it was your aunt’s, or your niece’s, or your sister’s — Caroline Somebody’s — Caroline Frazer’s, Charlotte Friar’s, anybody’s whose initials are C. F.”

  “O! but it wasn’t a woman’s night-cap, sir, it was a man’s; the sort of cap they hang folks in; and I should like to hang Old Mosey for beating my Anthony Thom,” rejoined Mrs. Margerum.

  “I’m afraid we can’t hang him for that,” replied Mr. Kebbel, laughing. “Might have him up for the assault, perhaps.”

  “Well, have him up for the assault,” rejoined Mrs. Margerum; “have him up for the assault. What business had he to beat my Anthony Thom?”

  “Get him fined a shilling, and have to pay your own costs, perhaps,” observed Mr. Kebbel; “better leave that alone, and stick to the parcel business — better stick to the parcel business. There are salient points in the case. The hour of the night is an awkward part,” continued he, biting his nails; “not but that the thing is perfectly capable of explanation, only the Beaks don’t like that sort of work, it won’t do for us to provoke an inquiry into the matter.”

  “Just so,” assented Mr. Gallon, who thought Mrs. Margerum had better be quiet.

  “Well, but it’s hard that my Anthony Thom’s to be beat, and get no redress!” exclaimed Mrs. Margerum, bursting into tears.

  “Hush, woman! hush!” muttered Mr. Gallon, giving her a dig in the ribs with his elbow; adding, “ye mun de what it liar tells ye.”

  “I’ll tell you what I can do,” continued Mr. Kebbel, after a pause. “They’ve got my old friend Mark Bull, the ex-Double-im-up-shire Super, into this force, and think him a great card. I’ll get him to go to Sir Moses about the matter; and if Mark finds we are all right about the cap, he’s the very man to put Mosey up to a prosecution, and then we shall make a rare harvest out of him,” Carrots rubbing his hands with glee at the idea of an action for a malicious prosecution.

  “Ay, that’ll be the gam,” said Mr. Gallon, chuckling,— “that’ll be the gam; far better nor havin’ of him oop for the ‘sult.”

  “I think so,” said Mr. Kebbel, “1 think so; at all events I’ll consider the matter; and if I send Mark to Sir Moses, I’ll tell him to come round by your place and let you know what he does; but, in the meantime,” continued Kebbel, rising and addressing Mrs. Margerum earnestly, “don’t you answer any questions to anybody, and tell Anthony Thom to hold his tongue too, and I’ve no doubt Mr. Gallon and I’ll make it all right;” so saying, Mr. Kebbel shook hands with them both, and stalked on to his petty-sessional practice.

  Gallon then coaxed Tippy Turn round, and, retracing his steps as far as Kimberley gate, paid the toll, and shot Mrs. Margerum out, telling her to make the best of her way back to the Rose and Crown, and stay there till he returned. Gallon then took the road to the right, leading on to the wide-extending Spankerley Downs; where, unharnessing Tippy Tom under lea of a secluded plantation, he produced a saddle and bridle from the back of the cart, which, putting on
, he mounted the high-stepping white, and was presently among the coursers, the greatest man at the meeting, some of the yokels, indeed, taking him for Sir Harry Fuzball himself.

  But when Mr. Mark Bull arrived at Sir Moses’s, things had taken another turn, for the Baronet, in breaking open what he thought was one of Mrs. Margerum’s boxes, had in reality got into Mr. Bankhead’s, where, finding his ticket of leave, he was availing himself of that worthy’s absence to look over the plate prior to dismissing him, and Sir Moses made so light of Anthony Thom’s adventure that the Super had his trouble for nothing. Thus the heads of the house — the Mr. and Mrs. in fact, were cleared out in one and the same day, by no means an unusual occurrence in an establishment, after which of course Sir Moses was so inundated with stories against them, that he almost resolved to imitate his great predecessor’s example and live at the Fox and Hounds Hotel at Hinton in future. To this place his mind was now more than ordinarily directed in consequence of the arrangements that were then making for the approaching Hunt Ball, to which long looked-for festival we will now request the company of the reader.

  CHAPTER LXI. THE HUNT BALL. — MISS DE GLANCEY’S REFLECTIONS.

  THE Hit-im and Hold-im shire hunt balls had long been celebrated for their matrimonial properties, as well for settling ripe flirtations, as for bringing to a close the billing and cooing of un-productive love, and opening fresh accounts with the popular firm of “Cupid and Co.” They were the greenest spot on the memory’s waste of many, on the minds of some whose recollections carried them back to the romping, vigorous Sir Roger de Coverley dances of Mr. Customer’s time, — of many who remembered the more stately glide of the elegant quadrille of Lord Martingal’s reign, down to the introduction of the once scandalising waltz and polka of our own. Many “Ask Mamma’s” had been elicited by these balls, and good luck was said to attend all their unions.