Post Haste
“And what was the message, Grannie?”
“She’s gone and forgot it,” said Solomon Flint, putting the sausages on the table, which had already been spread for supper by a stout little girl who was the sole domestic of the house and attendant on Mrs Flint. “You’ve no chance of getting it now, Miss May, for I’ve noticed that when the old ’ooman once forgets a thing it don’t come back to her—except, p’r’aps, a week or two afterwards. Come now, draw in and go to work. But, p’r’aps, Dollops may have heard the message. Hallo! Dollops! come here, and bring the kettle with you.”
Dollops—the little girl above referred to—was particularly small and shy, ineffably stupid, and remarkably fat. It was the last quality which induced Solomon to call her Dollops. Her hair and garments stuck out from her in wild dishevelment, but she was not dirty. Nothing belonging to Mrs Flint was allowed to become dirty.
“Did you see Miss Lillycrop, Dollops?” asked Solomon, as the child emerged from some sort of back kitchen.
“Yes, sir, I did; I saw’d ’er a-goin’ hout.”
“Did you hear her leave a message?”
“Yes, sir, I did. I ’eard ’er say to missis, ‘Be sure that you give May Maylands my love, an tell ’er wotever she do to keep ’er feet dry, an’ don’t forgit the message, an’ say I’m so glad about it, though it’s not much to speak of arter all!’”
“What was she so glad about?” demanded Solomon.
“I dun know, sir. She said no more in my ’earin’ than that. I only comed in w’en she was a-goin’ hout. P’r’aps it was about the findin’ of ’er gloves in ’er pocket w’en she was a talkin’ to missis, which she thought she’d lost, though they wasn’t wuth pickin’ up out of the—”
“Pooh! be off to your pots an’ pans, child,” said Flint, turning to his grandmother, who sat staring at the sausages with a blank expression. “You can’t remember it, I s’pose, eh?”
Mrs Flint shook her head and began to eat.
“That’s right, old ’ooman,” said her grandson, patting her shoulder; “heap up the coals, mayhap it’ll revive the memory.”
But Mrs Flint’s memory was not so easily revived. She became more abstracted than usual in her efforts to recover it. Supper passed and was cleared away. The old woman was placed in her easy chair in front of the fire with the cat—her chief evening amusement—on her knee; the letter-carrier went out for his evening walk; Dollops proceeded miscellaneously to clean up and smash the crockery, and May sat down to indite an epistle to the inmates of Rocky Cottage.
Suddenly Mrs Flint uttered an exclamation.
“May!” she cried, and hit the cat an involuntary slap on the face which sent it with a caterwaul of indignant surprise from her knee, “it wasn’t a message, it was a letter!”
Having thus unburdened her mind the old woman relapsed into the previous century, from which she could not be recalled. May, therefore, made a diligent search for the letter, and found it at last under a cracked teapot on the mantelpiece, where Mrs Flint had told Miss Lillycrop to place it for safety.
It was short but satisfactory, and ran thus:—
“Dearest May,—I’ve been to see my friend ‘in power,’ and he says it’s ‘all right,’ that you’ve only to get your brother over as soon as possible, and he’ll see to getting him a situation. The enclosed paper is for his and your guidance. Excuse haste.—Your affectionate coz, Sarah Lillycrop.”
It need hardly be said that May Maylands finished her letter with increased satisfaction, and posted it that night.
Next morning she wrote out a telegram as follows:– “Let Phil come here at once. The application has been successful. Never mind clothes. Everything arranged. Best love to all.”
The last clause was added in order to get the full value for her money. She naturally underscored the words “at once,” forgetting for the moment that, in telegraphy, a word underlined counts as two words. She was therefore compelled to forego the emphasis.
This message she did not transmit through her own professional instrument, but gave it in at the nearest district office. It was at once shot bodily, with a bundle of other telegrams, through a pneumatic tube, and thus reached St. Martin’s-le-Grand in one minute thirty-five seconds, or about twenty minutes before herself. Chancing to be the uppermost message, it was flashed off without delay, crossed the Irish Channel, and entered the office at Cork in about six minutes. Here there was a short delay of half-an-hour, owing to other telegrams which had prior claim to attention. Then it was flashed to the west coast, which it reached long before the letter posted on the previous night, and not long after May had seated herself at her own three-keyed instrument. But there, telegraphic speed was thwarted by unavoidable circumstances, the post-runner having already started on his morning rounds, and it was afternoon before the telegram was delivered at Rocky Cottage.
This was the telegram which had caused Philip Maylands so much anxiety. He read it at last with great relief, and at the same time with some degree of sadness, when he thought of leaving his mother “unprotected” in her lonely cottage by the sea.
Chapter Three.
Brilliant Prospects
Madge—whose proper name was Marjory Stevens—was absent when May’s letter arrived the following day. On her return to the cottage she was taken into the committee which sat upon the subject of Phil’s appointment.
“It’s not a very grand appointment,” said Mrs Maylands, with a sigh.
“Sure it’s not an appointment at all yet, mother,” returned Phil, who held in his hand the paper of instructions enclosed in May’s letter. “Beggars, you know, mustn’t be choosers; an’ if I’m not a beggar, it’s next thing to it I am. Besides, if the position of a boy-telegraph-messenger isn’t very exalted in itself, it’s the first step to better things. Isn’t the first round of a ladder connected with the top round?”
“That’s true, Phil,” said Madge; “there’s nothing to prevent your becoming Postmaster-General in course of time.”
“Nothing whatever, that I know of,” returned Phil.
“Perhaps somebody else knows of something that may prevent it,” said his mother with an amused smile.
“Perhaps!” exclaimed the boy, with a twinkle in his eye; “don’t talk to me of perhapses, I’m not to be damped by such things. Now, just consider this,” he continued, looking over the paper in his hand, “here we have it all in print. I must apply for the situation in writin’ no less. Well, I can do it in copperplate, if they please. Then my age must be not less than fourteen, and not more than fifteen.”
“That suits to a T,” said Madge.
“Yes; and, but hallo! what have we here?” said Phil, with a look of dismay.
“What is it?” asked his mother and Madge in the same breath, with looks of real anxiety.
“Well, well, it’s too bad,” said Phil slowly, “it says here that I’m to have ‘no claim on the superannuation fund.’ Isn’t that hard?”
A smile from Mrs Maylands, and a laugh from Madge, greeted this. It was also received with an appalling yell from the baby, which caused mother and nurse to leap to the rescue. That sprout of mischief, in the course of an experimental tour of the premises, had climbed upon a side-table, had twisted his right foot into the loop of the window-curtains, had fallen back, and hung, head downwards, howling.
Having been comforted with bread and treacle, and put to bed, the committee meeting was resumed.
“Well, then,” said Phil, consulting his paper again, “I give up the superannuation advantages. Then, as to wages, seven shillings a week, rising to eight shillings after one year’s service. Why, it’s a fortune! Any man at my age can live on sixpence a day easy—that’s three-and-six, leaving three-and-six a week clear for you, mother. Then there’s a uniform; just think o’ that!”
“I wonder what sort of uniform it is,” said Madge.
“A red coat, Madge, and blue trousers with silver lace and a brass helmet, for certain—”
“Don’t talk nonsense, boy,” interrupted Mrs Maylands, “but go on with the paper.”
“Oh! there’s nothing more worth mentioning,” said Phil, folding the paper, “except that boy-messengers, if they behave themselves, have a chance of promotion to boy-sorterships, indoor-telegraph-messengerships, junior sorterships, and letter-carrierships, on their reaching the age of seventeen, and, I suppose, secretaryships, and postmaster-generalships, with a baronetcy, on their attaining the age of Methuselah. It’s the very thing for me, mother, so I’ll be off to-morrow if—”
Phil was cut short by the bursting open of the door and the sudden entrance of his friend George Aspel.
“Come, Phil,” he cried, blazing with excitement, “there’s a wreck in the bay. Quick! there’s no time to lose.”
The boy leaped up at once, and dashed out after his friend.
It was evening. The gale, which had blown for two days was only beginning to abate. Dark clouds were split in the western sky by gleams of fiery light as the sun declined towards its troubled ocean-bed.
Hurrying over the fields, and bending low to the furious blast, Aspel and Philip made their way to the neighbouring cliffs. But before we follow them, reader, to the wave-lashed shore, it is necessary, for the satisfactory elucidation of our tale, that we should go backward a short way in time, and bound forward a long way into space.
Chapter Four.
The Royal Mail Steamer
Out, far out on the mighty sea, a large vessel makes her way gallantly over the billows—homeward bound.
She is a Royal Mail steamer from the southern hemisphere—the Trident—and a right royal vessel she looks with her towering iron hull, and her taper masts, and her two thick funnels, and her trim rigging, and her clean decks—for she has an awning spread over them, to guard from smoke as well as from sun.
There is a large family on board of the Trident, and, like all other large families, its members display marked diversities of character. They also exhibit, like not a few large families, remarkable diversities of temper. Among them there are several human magnets with positive and negative poles, which naturally draw together. There are also human flints and steels which cannot come into contact without striking fire.
When the Trident got up steam, and bade adieu to the Southern Cross, there was no evidence whatever of the varied explosives and combustibles which she carried in her after-cabin. The fifty or sixty passengers who waved kerchiefs, wiped their eyes, and blew their noses, at friends on the receding shore, were unknown to each other; they were intent on their own affairs. When obliged to jostle each other they were all politeness and urbanity.
After the land had sunk on the horizon the intro-circumvolutions of a large family, or rather a little world, began. There was a birth on board, an engagement, ay, and a death; yet neither the interest of the first, nor the romance of the second, nor the solemnity of the last, could check for more than a few hours the steady development of the family characteristics of love, modesty, hate, frivolity, wisdom, and silliness.
A proportion of the passengers were, of course, nobodies, who aspired to nothing greater than to live and let live, and who went on the even tenor of their way, without much change, from first to last. Some of them were somebodies who, after a short time, began to expect the recognition of that fact. There were ambitious bodies who, in some cases, aimed too high, and there were unpretending-bodies who frequently aimed too low. There were also selfish-bodies who, of course, thought only of themselves—with, perhaps, a slight passing reference to those among the after-cabin passengers who could give them pleasure, and there were self-forgetting-bodies who turned their thoughts frequently on the ship, the crew, the sea, the solar system, the Maker of the universe. These also thought of their fellow-passengers in the fore-cabin, who of course had a little family or world of their own, with its similar joys, and sins, and sorrows, before the mast; and there were uproarious-bodies who kept the little world lively—sometimes a little too lively.
As the Royal Mail steamer rushed out to sea and was tossed on the ocean’s breast, these human elements began to mix and effervesce and amalgamate, or fizz, burst, and go off, like squibs and crackers.
There was a Mrs Pods with three little girls, and a Mrs Tods with two little boys, whose first casual glance at each other was transmuted into a glare of undying and unreasoning hate. These ladies were exceptions to the rule of general urbanity before mentioned. Both had fiery faces, and each read the other through and through at a glance. There was a Miss Bluestocking who charmed some people, irritated others, frightened a few, and caused many to sneer. Her chief friend among the males was a young man named Mr Weakeyes, who had a small opinion of himself and a very receptive mind. Miss Troolove, among the ladies, was her chief friend. The strange misnomers which one meets with in society were also found in the little world in that steamer—that Royal Mail steamer we should say—for, while we turn aside for a brief period to condescend upon these particulars, we would not have the reader forget that they have an indirect bearing on the main thread of our tale.
One misnamed lady was a Miss Mist, who, instead of being light, airy, and ethereal, as she ought to have been, weighed at least twelve stone six. But she sang divinely, was a great favourite with the young people on board, and would have been very much missed indeed if she had not been there. There was also a Mr Stout, who was the tallest and thinnest man in the ship.
On the other hand there were some whose names had been obviously the result of a sense of propriety in some one. Among the men who were rabidly set on distinguishing themselves in one way or another was a Major Beak. Now, why was it that this Major’s nose was an aquiline of the most outrageous dimensions? Surely no one would argue that the nose grew to accommodate the name. Is it not more probable—nay, certain—that the name grew to accommodate the nose? Of course when Major Beak was born he was a minor, and his nose must have been no better than a badly-shaped button or piece of putty; but the Major’s father had owned a tremendous aquiline nose, which at birth had also been a button, and so on we can proceed backwards until we drive the Beaks into that remote antiquity where historical fact begins and mythological theory terminates—that period when men were wont, it is supposed, to name each other intelligently with reference to personal characteristic or occupation.
So, too, Mr Bright—a hearty good-natured fellow, who drew powerfully to Major Beak and hated Miss Bluestocking—possessed the vigorous frame, animated air, and intelligent look which must have originated his name. But why go on? Every reader must be well acquainted with the characters of Mr Fiery and Mr Stiff, and Mrs Dashington, and her niece Miss Squeaker, and Colonel Blare who played the cornet, and Lieutenant Limp who sang tenor, and Dr Bassoon who roared bass, and Mrs Silky, who was all things to all men, besides being everything by turns and nothing long; and Lady Tower and Miss Gentle, and Mr Blurt and Miss Dumbbelle.
Suffice it to say that after a week or two the effervescing began to systematise, and the family became a living and complex electrical machine, whose sympathetic poles drew and stuck together, while the antagonistic poles kept up a steady discharge of sparks.
Then there arose a gale which quieted the machine a little, and checked the sparkling flow of wit and humour. When, during the course of the gale, a toppling billow overbalanced itself and fell inboard with a crash that nearly split the deck open, sweeping two of the quarterboats away, Mr Blurt, sitting in the saloon, was heard to exclaim:—
“’Pon my word, it’s a terrible gale—enough almost to make a fellow think of his sins.”
To which Mrs Tods, who sat beside him, replied, with a serious shake of her head, that it was indeed a very solemn occasion, and cast a look, not of undying hate but of gentle appeal at Mrs Pods, who sat opposite to her. And that lady, so far from resenting the look as an affront, met her in a liberal spirit; not only admitted that what Mrs Tods had said was equally just and true, but even turned her eyes upward with a look of resignation.
Well was it for Mrs Pods that she did so, for her resigned eyes beheld the globe of the cabin lamp pitched off its perch by a violent lurch and coming straight at her. Thus she had time to bow to circumstances, and allow the missile to pass over her head into the bosom of Lady Tower, where it was broken to atoms. The effect of mutual concession was so strong on Mrs Pods and Mrs Tods, that the former secretly repented having wished that one of Mrs Tods’ little sons might fall down the hatchway and get maimed for life, while the latter silently regretted having hoped that one of Mrs Pods’ little girls might fall overboard and be half-drowned.
But the storm passed away and the effervescence returned—though not, it is pleasing to add, with so much pungency as before. Thus, night and day, the steamer sped on over the southern seas, across the mystic line, and into the northern hemisphere, with the written records, hopes, commands, and wishes of a continent in the mail-bags in her hold, and leaving a beautiful milky-way behind her.
But there were more than letters and papers in these mail-bags. There were diamonds! Not indeed those polished and glittering gems whose proper resting-place is the brow of beauty, but those uncut pebbles that are turned up at the mines, which the ignorant would fling away or give to their children as playthings, but for which merchants and experts would give hundreds and thousands of pounds. A splendid prize that Royal Mail steamer would have been for the buccaneers of the olden time, but happily there are no buccaneers in these days—at least not in civilised waters. A famous pirate had, however, set his heart on those diamonds—even old Neptune himself.
This is how it happened.
Chapter Five.
Wreck and Rescue
One evening Miss Gentle and rotund little Mr Blurt were seated on two camp-stools near the stern, conversing occasionally and gazing in a dreamy frame of mind at the milky-way over which they appeared to travel.
“I wonder much, Miss Gentle,” said Mr Blurt, “that you were not more afraid during that gale we had just before crossing the line?”
“I was a good deal afraid, though perhaps I did not show it. Your remark,” she added, with an arch glance at her companion, “induces me to express some surprise that you seemed so much afraid.”
“Afraid!” echoed Mr Blurt, with a smile; “why, I wasn’t afraid—eh! was I?”
“I beg pardon,” hastily explained Miss Gentle, “I don’t mean frightened, of course; perhaps I should have said alarmed, or agitated—”
“Agitated!” cried Mr Blurt, pulling off his hat, and rubbing his bald head—he was prematurely bald, being only forty, though he looked like fifty—“agitated! Well, Miss Gentle, if you had diamonds—”
He stopped short, and looked at his companion with a confused smile.
“Diamonds, Mr Blurt,” said Miss Gentle, slightly surprised; “what do you mean?”
“Well—ha! hem!” said the other, rubbing his forehead; “I see no reason why I should make a mystery of it. Since I have mentioned the thing, I may as well say that a man who happens to have a packet of diamonds in the mail-bags worth about twenty thousand pounds, may well be excused showing some little agitation lest the ship containing them should go to the bottom.”
“I don’t quite see that,” returned Miss Gentle. “If the owner is on board, and goes to the bottom with his diamonds, it does not matter to him, does it?”
“Ah!” said Mr Blurt, “it is the inconsiderateness of youth which prompts that speech. (Miss Gentle looked about twenty, though she was in reality twenty-seven!) Do you think I have no anxiety for any one but myself? Suppose I have a wife and family in England who are dependent on these diamonds.”
“Ah! that did not occur to me,” returned the lady.
“Have you any objection to become a confidante?” asked Mr Blurt.
“None whatever,” replied Miss Gentle, laughing.
“Well, then, to let you understand my feelings, I shall explain. I have a brother—a dear little fellow like mys— ah, excuse me; I did not mean dear like myself, but little. Well, he is a naturalist. He lives in London, and is not a very successful naturalist; indeed, I may say that he is an unfortunate and poor naturalist. Last year he failed. I sent him a small sum of money. He failed again. I sent him more money. Being a successful diamond-merchant, you see, I could afford to do so. We are both bachelors; my brother being much older than I am. At last I resolved to send home my whole fortune, and return to live with him, after winding up my affairs. I did so: made up my diamonds into a parcel, and sent it by mail as being the most secure method. Just after doing this, I got a letter informing me of my brother being dangerously ill, and begging me to come to England without delay. I packed up at once, left my partner to wind up the business, and so, here I am, on board the very steamer that carries my diamonds to England.”
“How curious—and how interesting,” said the sympathetic Miss Gentle.
Whatever more she intended to say was checked by a large parti-coloured ball hitting her on the cheek, and falling into her lap. It was followed up and captured with a shriek by the two little Todses and the three little Podses. At the same moment the gong sounded for tea. Thus the conversation came to a close.
The voyage of the Trident—with the exception of the gale before referred to—was prosperous until her arrival in the waters of the northern hemisphere. By that time the passengers had crystallised into groups, the nobodies and self-forgetting-bodies fraternised, and became more and more friendly as time went on. The uproarious-bodies got up concerts and charades. The hatred of Pods for Tods intensified. The arrogance of Major Beak, and the good-natured modesty of Mr Bright, increased. The noise of Dr Bassoon made the manner of Mr Silky quite agreeable by contrast, while the pride of Lady Tower and Mr Stiff formed a fine, deep-shade to the neutral tint of Miss Gentle, and the high-light of Miss Squeaker.
Gradually, however, feelings began to modify. The squalls and breezes that ruffled the human breasts on board the Trident moderated in exact proportion as that vessel penetrated and experienced the storms of what should have been named the in-temperate zone.
At last they drew near to the shores of Old England, and then there burst upon them a nor-wester, so violent that within the first hour the close-reefed topsails were blown to ribbons, and the foretopmast, with the jib-boom, was carried away. Of course this was a comparatively small matter in a steamer, but when it was afterwards discovered that the vessel had sprung a leak, things began to look more serious.
“It’s only a trifle, Miss Gentle; don’t alarm yourself. We can put that to rights in a few minutes,” said Major Beak, with the confident air of a man whose nautical education had begun with Noah, and continued uninterruptedly down to the present time.
“He’s a hooked-nosed humbug, Miss Gentle, an’ knows nothing about it,” growled the captain.
“Water rising rapidly in the hold, sir,” said the carpenter, coming aft and touching his cap.
“Rig the pumps,” said the captain, and the pumps were rigged. What is more to the purpose, they were wrought with a will by the crew; but in spite of their efforts the water continued to rise.
It might have done a student of human nature good to have observed the effect of this information on the passengers. Regarded as a whole the little world became perceptibly paler in the cheeks, and strikingly moderate in tone of voice and manner. Major Beak, in particular, began to talk low, and made no reference whatever to nautical matters, while Mrs Pods looked amiably—almost affectionately—at Mrs Tods.
Of course the passengers observed with breathless interest the action of the captain at this crisis. That important personage did his best to stop the leak, but only succeeded in checking it, and it required the constant exertions of the crew night and day at the pumps to reduce the water in the hold even by an inch. In these circumstances the young men among the passengers readily volunteered their services to assist the crew.