The maid stared at him. “He’s waiting to be attended to,” she said firmly.
“Wait—” gasped Mr. Biggs. “Wait —
Where is the room? I want to see him.”
He followed close on her heels, and burst into a stiff, cheerless-looking room furnished with soiled copies of Punch and illustrated papers of the year before last. Albert, who was reading a paper, put it down and eyed him languidly.
“What’s all this about?” demanded the chauffeur.” Why aren’t you ready? What have you been doing?”
“Missed my appointment,” said Albert, with a faint sigh. “I told you it was for three o’clock. But I don’t mind waiting; this is a most interesting story.”
“You hurry up,” said Mr. Biggs truculently, “else you’ll be sorry for it, you miserable little toad!”
“You’ve no right to talk to him like that,” said a middle-aged woman, who was the only other occupant of the room. “In my opinion the boy is a perfect little gentleman. He’s already given up his turn to two people; and I’m sure he’s suffering.”
“Very good,” said Mr. Biggs, after a merciful attack of speechlessness. “Very good; I’ll tell Mr. Carstairs of this.”
“Mr. Carstairs wouldn’t mind; it’s the thing he would do himself,” retorted Albert in a saintly voice. “He—”
“Ready for you now,” said the maid, opening the door and beckoning.
Albert rose, and, with a somewhat disappointed glance at the clock, went out.
“We shall just do it,” said Mr. Biggs, returning to the car. “I don’t suppose it’ll take more than a minute now.”
He started the engine and resumed his seat. Ten minutes later he switched it off again, and sat in a state of suppressed fury listening to the complaints of his distressed companion.
“It’s all your fault,” she said hotly. “If you hadn’t been so clever teasing the boy it wouldn’t have happened.”
“You enjoyed it,” urged Mr. Biggs. “I saw you smiling.”
“You won’t see me smile again in a hurry,” said Miss Mudge grimly. “But go on, put the blame on me! Anything more you would like to say?”
She pitched the box of chocolates on the floor of the car, and, opening the door, stepped out and paced restlessly up and down the footpath. At exactly twenty minutes to five the dentist’s front door opened, and Albert, with a somewhat improved appearance, paused on the top step for a few words with the maid. He sauntered down the steps just as Mr. Biggs started the engine.
“Where have you been?” demanded the chauffeur, glaring at him. “Don’t you try and tell me that it has taken him all this time to draw a tooth.”
“No, it wouldn’t be true,” said Albert. “He found another tooth with a hole in it; so I told him he might as well stop it. He’s got a thing like a sewing-machine, and—”
He drew back appalled before the frenzy in Mr. Biggs’s face.
“Are you going to start, or are we going to stay here all day?” inquired Miss Mudge. “Get up, Albert.”
“It’s your place,” said the boy quickly.
“I’m going in behind,” said the girl.
“I’ll come, too,” said Albert.
“Not with me, you won’t,” said the girl, getting in and closing the door. “Make haste and get in. There’s a box of chocolates on the floor you can have.”
“No, he can’t!” grunted Mr. Biggs, as the car started.
“They’re my chocolates,” said Miss Mudge, “and I can give them to who I like. Pick them up, Albert.”
The boy, with his eye on the chauffeur, obeyed.
“Now eat them.”
Albert shook his head, but, the command being repeated, drew a large chocolate, decorated with a crystallised violet, from the box, and delicately bit off the end. Slight sucking noises testified to his enjoyment, and after a minute or two of very justifiable nervousness he settled back in his seat and gave himself up to the full enjoyment of the position.
“Thank you for a very pleasant afternoon,” said Miss Mudge, with a toss of her head, as she descended at the gate. “And thanks so much for getting me into trouble.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” said the hapless Mr. Biggs.
“Being done by a babe in arms like that!” said Miss Mudge, with a glance at Albert. “I’d be ashamed of myself. Thank goodness you’re not coming to sea with us!”
“I don’t know so much about that,” said Mr. Biggs. “Perhaps I can if I want to. Perhaps Lady Penrose won’t take you — now.”
Miss Mudge slammed the gate.
CHAPTER XII
MR. BIGGS put the matter of the yacht right next day. It appeared from his own showing that he could be of great use in the engine-room, while, on the other hand, as an honest man and an Englishman, he had a great objection to staying at home on full pay with nothing to do for it. Permission was accorded so readily that, relating the matter to Mr. Watson afterwards, he was half disposed to regret that he had not asked to go as a passenger.
“Cheek’ll do anything almost,” assented Mr. Watson. “What do you know about a ship’s engines?”
“More than you know about a car’s,” retorted the other. “When a man’s got a head for machinery — which you haven’t — nothing comes amiss to him. I haven’t seen the machinery I couldn’t understand, yet.”
“That shows your sense,” said Watson. “It’s no good going out of your way to look for trouble, I mean. However, I hope you’ll have a good time; I’m going to. I wonder the guv’nor don’t take the housemaids and the gardeners as well; they could lend you a hand in the engine-room.”
As a matter of fact, the rest of the staff, with one exception, manifested no desire to tempt their fortunes on the stormy deep. Board wages and an easy existence for some months was the height of their ambition. The exception was Albert, and, until his desires were made known, a little confusion was caused by his unusual behaviour.
“I’d sooner have a ghost in the place,” declared Pope to Carstairs one day. “The little beast simply haunts me. What’s the matter with him?”
Carstairs shook his head. “I seem to have seen more of him lately,” he remarked. “I have nearly fallen over him twice.”
“Whenever I turn my head, there is that infernal boy somewhere near,” said Pope. “And there’s a curious pale smile about him I don’t like. D’ye think it’s mental?”
“No, no!” said Carstairs hastily. “Of course it isn’t. Don’t give way to such fancies; they’re unhealthy. Your head is all right.”
“Mine?” gasped his incensed friend. “Mine? I am talking about the boy’s. He’s getting very strange in his manner. Only yesterday he stole up behind me and picked a bit of fluff off my coat. I didn’t know he was there, and it gave me quite a turn.”
“That’s odd,” said Carstairs, looking perplexed. “He picked two bits of fluff off me this morning. At two different times.”
“Let’s have him up and question him,” said Pope, crossing to the bell. “Tackle him gently.”
“Bait your coat with a piece of fluff,” said Carstairs, with a grin; “that would give us an opening.”
Albert, whose conscience was no clearer than that of the average page, received the summons with some trepidation. The slow arranging of Mr. Pope’s pince-nez added to his discomfiture, and he stood trying to think out replies to any misdemeanours with which he might be charged.
“Have you quite recovered from your visit to the dentist?” inquired Carstairs.
“Me, sir? Yessir,” replied the boy.
“You don’t appear to be quite well,” said Carstairs musingly.
“Perfectly well, sir,” said the puzzled Albert. “Thank you, sir.”
“Then what do you mean by it?” inquired Pope, taking off his folders and shaking them at him threateningly. “What do you keep getting in my way for and following me about? And Mr. Carstairs?”
“Nothing, sir,” said Albert. “I — I didn’t know you had noticed it, sir.”
&nbs
p; “That’s an admission,” said Pope, turning a red face to Carstairs.
“I — I wanted to ask you something, sir,” said the boy, turning to the latter.
“Well?”
Albert twisted his hands together. “I wanted to ask — whether — I could go,” he said desperately.
“Go!” repeated his astonished employer.” Why, of course you can. Why didn’t you ask before?”
The tension of Albert’s features relaxed, and was succeeded by a radiant smile. “I thought there mightn’t be room, sir,” he said simply.
Carstairs turned with a perplexed gaze to Pope. “Room?” he repeated slowly. “Room?”
“On the boat, sir,” explained the boy, staring in his turn.
A startled grunt from Mr. Pope and a sudden exclamation from Mr. Carstairs added to his mystification. Carstairs was the first to recover.
“Of course,” he said, smiling. “Very thoughtful of you; but I have no doubt we shall be able to find room somewhere.”
“If we couldn’t,” said Pope, with great solemnity, “we’d make it.”
Albert eyed him dubiously, and, retiring in good order, closed the door and danced downstairs in an ecstasy of delight.
“That settles it; we must now redouble our efforts to get a satisfactory craft,” said Carstairs. “It would never do to break faith with Albert.”
“He would be much more disappointed than Lady Penrose,” said Pope. “We had better go up to-morrow and see that yacht broker Talwyn mentioned. Tollhurst offered to come with us. He — he is going to help me buy guns and things.”
“Guns?” said his friend, staring.
“Must have a shot-gun,” replied Pope, reddening. “One thing is, it will be useful down here. And perhaps a rifle. Every man ought to know how to use one. Might be useful on board. You never know.”
Carstairs groaned. “You’ve been talking to Tollhurst,” he said accusingly. “All right. We’ll mount a couple of brass cannon as well. What about a black flag?”
Pope turned a deaf ear. At the age of fifty he had resolved to become a sportsman; a resolution partly due to the narratives of Captain Tollhurst, and partly to the rabbits which came out in their thousands in the park at sunset. Up to the present he had contented himself with taking sighting-shots at them with a walking-stick, developing an accuracy of aim which he felt sure would prove of value later on. Birds — half a mile distant — had also been satisfactorily accounted for.
They took the business of the yacht first next day, a story of a rhinoceros and Captain Tollhurst helping to beguile the tedium of the journey. A story told so modestly that only the thoughtful listener could appreciate the high courage and resourcefulness displayed by the survivor.
It was a matter of surprise to Carstairs, who had never given the matter much thought, that the choice of steam yachts of the tonnage required was a somewhat limited one, but by what the broker described as an extraordinary slice of luck the very craft they were looking for was at that moment undergoing repairs at Southampton. Photographs and plans seemed eminently satisfactory, and they left after making an arrangement to view the Starlight, fourteen hundred tons, three days later.
“It would have been more interesting,” said Tollhurst, as they returned to the car, “to have hired a small sailing yacht.”
“You mean more dangerous,” said Pope accusingly. “So far as I am concerned, I prefer size and security.”
The captain laughed and shook his head. “A little element of uncertainty, that is all,” he replied “Not for the ladies,” said Pope solemnly.
“I had forgotten them,” was the reply.
“I expect we shall have all the uncertainty we want,” said Carstairs amiably; “but if you find the voyage palls we can always land you and Pope at some place where you can risk your lives. And pick you up afterwards — if there is anything to pick up. Now, what about these guns?”
Tollhurst gave a direction to Biggs, and five minutes afterwards they pulled up at a gunsmith’s and laid the foundations of a small but efficient armoury. A hammerless ejector gun, a sporting rifle, a rabbit rifle, and an automatic pistol of the newest pattern went home with Pope in the car.
“To-morrow,” he said, toying with the little rifle, “I will get my hand in on a few rabbits.”
Tollhurst nodded. “I will come with you,” he said; “but I should advise the gun to begin with. A rabbit is a small target, you know.”
“You know best,” said Pope, somewhat ungraciously. “I thought there would be more sport with a bullet, that is all. The shot-gun is too certain.”
“Sheer butchery,” said Carstairs, with a glance at Tollhurst.
“They ought to have a chance,” said Pope judicially. “However, if Tollhurst doesn’t think so, perhaps I had better take the gun.”
“Take the rifle by all means, if you wish,” said Tollhurst. “The head is as good a place to hit them in as any,” he added, with a return glance at Carstairs.
It was a scarcely perceptible glance, but Pope saw it and lapsed into silence, which, except for an occasional grunt, he maintained until the end of the journey. Upon one thing he was determined: he would astonish them all next day.
He arose at six next morning, and went out for a little preliminary rifle practice. Ten shots at the trunk of a beech tree at fifty yards furnished no data, the wood simply swallowing the bullets without revealing the place of entry. An empty tomato-can perched on a post deflected them at ten yards’ range in a way that was almost uncanny. If a tomato-can could behave in that fashion, what might be expected of a rabbit? Perturbed in spirit, Mr. Pope returned to the house and, meeting Biggs on the way, gave him the rifle to clean.
In the result he resolved to thin the rabbits out (his own expression) with the gun, and soon after six that evening, accompanied by Tollhurst, he set off to a sandy bank on the confines of the park. Trees and gorse afforded good cover, and, stealing up with the caution of a Red Indian, he discharged both barrels at a little group forty yards distant. The earth swallowed them up immediately, including the two he had hit.
“I’ll swear I winged them,” he said, after a search.
Tollhurst nodded. “Gone to die in their holes,” he said briefly. “Often happens. We must try further along now.”
They went on in silence, Pope with his lips pursed and his gun ready. Restless rabbits, unable to stay in one place for more than a second or two at a time, he ignored. He wanted something less mobile, and it presented itself at last in the shape of a huge elderly buck rabbit which was sitting under an oak tree taking the air. Trembling with excitement, Pope held his breath, and was just taking careful aim, when the veteran arose and went for a gentle constitutional behind a clump of gorse.
“It’s gone,” whispered Pope.
“Plenty more,” said his friend. “Be quicker next time.”
Mr. Pope attributed his failure to that advice. Left to himself, he felt sure that he could have shot rabbits. As it was, bits of gorse were blown to pieces and patches of turf rose into the air. At the end of an hour Tollhurst, looking in the direction of the house, muttered something about dinner.
“I’ll come when I’ve got a rabbit,” said Pope grimly. “You go.”
Left to himself, he flitted noiselessly about and blazed away at intervals, until at length, tired and dispirited, he sat down and drew out his cigarette case. A figure approaching in the dusk drew near, and revealed itself as Mr. Biggs.
“Any sport, sir?” inquired the chauffeur respectfully.
Pope told him. He also referred in scathing terms to the acrobatic proclivities of his quarry.
Mr. Biggs looked longingly at the gun. “Long time since I shot any, sir,” he said, with a sigh.
“Can you shoot?” inquired Pope.
“I’ve shot thousands in my time, sir,” said the chauffeur, “when I was a boy, at home.”
Pope took up his gun and held it out to him. “Kill a few thousands now,” he said vindictively.
&n
bsp; Mr. Biggs thanked him and withdrew noiselessly. An occasional report indicated that he was doing his best to carry out instructions. Pope, leaning back with a pleasant sense of fatigue, went on smoking. It was not until he had finished his third cigarette that he saw the chauffeur returning.
“Any luck?” he called out.
Mr. Biggs shook his head. “I won’t blame them,” he said frankly. “I suppose my eye is out, or my hand; perhaps both.”
“But—” said Pope, and pointed to three rabbits the other was carrying.
“Not mine, sir,” said Biggs. “Wish they were. I picked them up as I went along.”
Pope stared at him. “They must be mine, then,” he said, in a puzzled voice.
“Unless anybody else has been shooting,” said Mr. Biggs, gazing afar off. “They’re fresh killed. You must have been shooting better than you thought.”
Mr. Pope thought so, too, and, extending his hand for the rabbits and the gun, set off in the direction of the house. Mr. Biggs accompanied him half-way, and then, with a respectful “Good night,” turned off.
Tired but happy, Pope reached the house, and, rejecting the offer of a footman to take his burden, made his way to the dining-room, and stood framed in the doorway. A slight exclamation from Tollhurst called attention to his presence.
“Well done!” said Carstairs.
Pope smiled. “Not much of a bag,” he said modestly.
“Poor things!” said Mrs. Ginnell, shaking her head at him. “Murderer!”
“Not at all,” murmured Pope.
CHAPTER XIII
THE inspection of the yacht was so satisfactory that Carstairs made up his mind on the spot, and for the next month or two had many pleasant jaunts to Southampton to mark progress. Members of the expedition spent the time in providing things for the voyage according to their several tastes; the fact that Albert had laid in a stock of three mouth organs and a tin whistle coming in for much adverse comment on the part of Mr. Biggs.
The Starlight weighed anchor on a fine morning in early October. A light breeze and a slight touch of autumn in the air added to the enjoyment of the voyagers, whose numbers were now increased by an unnecessarily good-looking young doctor named Maloney, and Miss Flack, a spinster of mature years and lifelong friend of Mrs. Jardine. Seated in little groups on deck, Mr. Carstairs’ guests, idly watching the passing craft, looked forward with some zest to a life of exciting but harmless adventure. The doctor, who had made several voyages, was pleased to find himself regarded as an authority on all things nautical, and was at once elevated to a position from which the other men sought in vain to remove him.
Works of W. W. Jacobs Page 88
