I wish to have nothing more to do with them, forI feel naturally that they took a cruel advantage of my youth and inexperience, and I shall always resent the deception and constraint to which I so nearly fell a victim.
But it occurs to me that those who may have followed my strange story with any curiosity and interest may be slightly disappointed at its conclusion, which I cannot deny is a lame and unsatisfactory one.
They expected, no doubt, to be told what the Curse's personal appearance is, and how it comports itself in that ghastly Grey Chamber, what it said to me, and what I said to it, and what happened after that.
This information, as will be easily understood, I cannot pretend to give, and, for myself, I have long ceased to feel the slightest curiosity on any of these points. But for the benefit of such as are less indifferent, I may suggest that almost any eligible bachelor would easily obtain the opportunities I failed to enjoy by simply calling at the old mansion at Parson's Green, and presenting himself to the baronet as a suitor for his daughter's hand.
I shall be most happy to allow my name to be used as a reference.
'D
andy, come here, sir; I want you.' The little girl who spoke was standing by the table in the morning-room of a London house one summer day, and she spoke to a small silver-grey terrier lying curled up at the foot of one of the window curtains.
As Dandy happened to be particularly comfortable just then, he pretended not to hear, in the hope that his child-mistress would not press the point.
But she did not choose to be trifled with in this way: he was called more imperiously still, until he could dissemble no longer and came out gradually, stretching himself and yawning with a deep sense of injury.
'I know you haven't been asleep; I saw you watching the flies,' she said. 'Come up here, on the table.'
Seeing there was no help for it, he obeyed, and sat down on the table-cloth opposite to her, with his tongue hanging out and his eyes blinking, waiting her pleasure.
Dandy was rather particular as to the hands he allowed to touch him, but generally speaking, he found it pleasant enough (when he had nothing better to do) to resign himself to be pulled about, lectured, or caressed by Hilda.
She was a strikingly pretty child, with long curling brown locks, and a petulant profile, which reminded one of Mr. Doyle's charming wilful little fairy princesses.
On the whole, although Dandy privately considered she had taken rather a liberty in disturbing him, he was willing to overlook it
'I've been thinking, Dandy,' said Hilda, reflectively, 'that as you and Lady Angelina will be thrown a good deal together when we go into the country next week, you ought to know one another, and you've never been properly introduced yet; so I'm going to introduce you now.'
Now Lady Angelina was only Hilda's doll, and a doll, too, with perhaps as few ideas as any doll ever had yet—which is a good deal to say.
Dandy despised her with all the enlightenment of a thoroughly superior dog; he considered there was simply nothing in her, except possibly bran, and it had made him jealous and angry for a long time tonotice the influence that this staring, simpering creature had managed to gain over her mistress.
'Now sit up,' said Hilda. Dandy sat up. He felt that committed him to nothing, but he was careful not to look at Lady Angelina, who was lolling ungracefully in the work-basket with her toes turned in.
'Lady Angelina,' said Hilda next, with great ceremony, 'let me introduce my particular friend Mr. Dandy. Dandy, you ought to bow and say something nice and clever, only you can't; so you must give Angelina your paw instead.'
Here was an insult for a self-respecting dog! Dandy determined never to disgrace himself by presenting his paw to a doll; it was quite against his principles. He dropped on all fours rebelliously.
'That's very rude of you,' said Hilda, 'but you shall do it. Angelina will think it so odd of you. Sit up again and give your paw, and let Angelina stroke your head.'
The dog's little black nose wrinkled and his lips twitched, showing his sharp white teeth: he was not going to be touched by Angelina's flabby wax hand if he could help it!
Unfortunately, Hilda, like older people sometimes, was bent upon forcing persons to know one another, in spite of an obvious unwillingness on at least one side, and so she brought the doll up to the terrier, and, taking one limp pink arm, attempted to pat the dog's head with it.
This was too much: his eyes flamed red like two signal lamps, there was a sharp sudden snap, and the next minute Lady Angelina's right arm was crunched viciously between Dandy's keen teeth.
After that there was a terrible pause. Dandy knew he was in for it, but he was not sorry. He dropped the mangled pieces of wax one by one, and stood there with his head on one side, growling to himself, but wincing for all that, for he was afraid to meet Hilda's indignant grey eyes.
'You abominable, barbarous dog!' she said at last, using the longest words she could to impress him. 'See what you've done! you've bitten poor Lady Angelina's arm off.'
He could not deny it; he had. He looked down at the fragments before him, and then sullenly up again at Hilda. His eyes said what he felt—'I'm glad of it—serves her right; I'd do it again.'
'You deserve to be well whipped,' continued Hilda, severely; 'but you do howl so. I shall leave you to your own conscience' (a favourite remark of her governess) 'until your bad heart is touched, and you come here and say you're sorry and beg both our pardons. I only wish you could be made to pay for a new arm. Go away out of my sight, you bad dog; I can't bear to look at you!'
Dandy, still impenitent, moved leisurely down from the table and out of the open door into the kitchen. He was thinking that Angelina's arm wasvery nasty, and he should like something to take the taste away. When he got downstairs, however, he found the butcher was calling and had left the area gate open, which struck him as a good opportunity for a ramble. By the time he came back Hilda would have forgotten all about it, or she might think he was lost, and find out which was the more valuable animal—a silly, useless doll, or an intelligent dog like himself.
Hilda saw him from the window as he bolted out with tail erect. 'He's doing it to show off,' she said to herself; 'he's a horrid dog sometimes. But I suppose I shall have to forgive him when he comes back!'
However, Dandy did not come back that night, nor all next day, nor the day after that, nor any more; for the fact was, an experienced dog-stealer had long had his eye upon him, and Dandy happened to come across him that very morning.
He was not such a stupid dog as to be unaware he was doing wrong in following a stranger, but then the man had such delightful suggestions about him of things dogs love to eat, and Dandy had started for his run in a disobedient temper.
So he followed the broken-nosed, bandy-legged man till they reached a narrow lonely alley, and then just as Dandy was thinking about going home again, the stranger turned suddenly on him, hemmed him up in a corner, caught him dexterously up in onehand, tapped him sharply on the head, and slipped him, stunned, into a capacious inside pocket.
'I thought werry likely I should come on you in 'ere, Bob,' said a broken-nosed man in a fur cap, about a week after Dandy's disappearance, to a short, red-faced, hoarse man who was drinking at the bar of a public-house.
'Ah,' said the hoarse man; 'well, you ain't fur out as it happens.'
'Yes, I did,' said the other. 'I met your partner the other day, and he tells me you're looking out for a noo Toby dawg. I've got a article somewheres about me at this moment I should like you to cast a eye over.'
And, diving into his inside pocket he fished out a small shining silver-grey terrier which he slammed down rather roughly on the pewter counter.
Of course the terrier was Hilda's lost Dandy. For some reason or other, the dog-stealer had not thought it prudent to claim the reward offered for him as he had intended to do at first, and Dandy, not being of a breed in fashionable demand, the man was trying to get rid of him now for the best price he could obtain from humble purchasers.
'Well, wedowant a understudy, and that's a fact,' said the hoarse man, who was one of the managers of Mr. Punch's Theatre. 'The Toby as travels with us now is breakin' up, getting so blind he don't knowPunch from Jack Ketch. But that there animal 'ud never make a 'it as a Toby,' he said, examining Dandy critically: 'why, that's bin a gen'leman's dawg once, that has—we don't want no amatoors on our show.'
'It's the amatoors as draws nowadays,' said the dog-fancier: 'not but what this 'ere partic'lar dawg has his gifts for the purfession. You see him sit up and smoke a pipe and give yer his paw, now.'
And he put Dandy through these performances on the sloppy counter. It was much worse than being introduced to Angelina; but hunger and fretting and rough treatment had broken down the dog's spirit, and it was with dull submission now that he repeated the poor little tricks Hilda had taught him with such pretty perseverance.
'It's no use talking,' said the showman, though he began to show some signs of yielding. 'It takes a tyke born and bred to make a reg'lar Toby. And this ain't a young dog, and he ain't 'ad no proper dramatic eddication; he's not worth to us not the lowest you'd take for him.'
'Well now, I'll tell you 'ow fur I'm willing to meet yer,' said the other persuasively; 'you shall have him, seein' it'syou, for——' And so they haggled on for a little longer, but at the end of the interview Dandy had changed hands, and was permanently engaged as a member of Mr. Punch's travelling company.
A few days after that Dandy made acquaintance with his strange fellow-performers. The men had put the show up on a deserted part of a common near London, behind the railings of a little cemetery where no one was likely to interfere with them, and the new Toby was hoisted up on the very narrow and uncomfortable shelf to go through his first interview with Mr. Punch.
When that popular gentleman appeared at his side Dandy examined him with pricked and curious ears. He was rather odd-looking, but his smile, though there was certainly a good deal of it, seemed genial and encouraging, and the poor dog wagged his tail in a conciliatory manner—he wanted some one to be kind to him again.
'The dawg's a fool, Bob,' growled Jem, the other proprietor of the show, a little shabby dirty-faced man with a thin and ragged red beard, who was watching the experiment from the outside; 'he's a-waggin' his bloomin' tail—he'll be a-lickin of Punch's face next! Try him with a squeak.'
And Bob produced a sound which was a hideous compound of chuckle, squeak, and crow, when Dandy, in the full persuasion that the strange figure must be a new variety of cat, flew at it blindly.
But though he managed to get a firm grip of its great hook nose, there was not much satisfaction to be got out of that—the hard wood made his teeth ache, and besides, in his excitement he overbalancedhimself and came suddenly down upon Mr. Robert Blott inside, who swore horribly and put him up again.
Then, after a little highly mysterious dancing up and down, and wagging his head, Mr. Punch, in the most uncalled-for manner, hit Dandy over the head with a stick, in order, as Jem put it, 'to get up a ill-feeling between them'—a wanton insult that made the dog madder than ever.
He did not revenge himself at once: he only barked furiously and retreated to his corner of the stage; but the next time Punch came sidling cautiously up to him, Dandy made, not for his wooden head, but for a place between his shoulders which he thought looked more yielding.
There was a savage howl from below, Punch dropped in a heap on the narrow shelf, and Mr. Blott sucked his finger and thumb with many curses.
Mr. Punch was not killed, however, though Dandy had at first imagined he had settled him. He revived almost directly, when he proceeded to rain down such a shower of savage blows from his thick stick upon every part of the dog's defenceless body, that Dandy was completely subdued long before his master thought fit to leave off.
By the time the lesson came to an end, Dandy was sore and shaken and dazed, for Bob had allowed himself to be a little carried away by personal feeling. Still it only showed Dandy more plainly that Mr.Punch was not a person to be trifled with, and, though he liked him as little as ever, he respected as well as feared him.
Unfortunately for Dandy, he was a highly intelligent terrier, of an inquiring turn of mind, and so, after he had been led about for some days with the show, and was able to think things over and put them together, he began to suspect that Punch and the other figures were not alive after all, but only a particularly ugly set of dolls, which Mr. Blott put in motion in some way best known to himself.
From the time he was perfectly certain of this he felt a degraded dog indeed. He had scorned once to allow himself to be even touched by Angelina (who at least was not unpleasant to look at, and always quite inoffensive): now, every hour of his life he found himself ordered about and insulted before a crowd of shabby strangers by a vulgar tawdry doll, to which he was obliged to be civil and even affectionate—as if it was something real!
Dandy was an honest dog, and so, of course, it was very revolting to his feelings to have to impose upon the public in this manner; but Mr. Punch, if he was only a doll, had a way of making himself obeyed.
And though in time the new Toby learnt to perform his duties respectably enough, he did so without the least enthusiasm: it wounded his pride—besides making him very uncomfortable—when Punch caught hold of his head, and something with red whiskersand a blue frock took him by the hind legs, and danced jerkily round the stage with him. He hated that more than anything. Day by day he grew more miserable and homesick.
He loathed the Punch and Judy show and every doll in it, from the hero down to the ghost and the baby. Jem and Bob were not actually unkind to him, and would even have been friendly had he allowed it; but he was a dainty dog, with a natural dislike to ill-dressed and dirty persons, and shrank from their rough if well-meant advances. He never could forget what he had once been, and what he was, and often, in the close sleeping-room of some common lodging-house, he dreamed of the comfortable home he had lost, and Hilda's pretty imperious face, and woke to miss her more than ever.
At first his new masters had been careful to keep him from all chance of escape, and Bob led him after the show by a string; but, as he seemed to be getting resigned to his position, allowed him to run loose.
He was trotting tamely at Jem's heels one hot August morning, followed by a small train of admiring children, when all at once he became aware that he was in a street he knew well—he was near his old home—a few minutes' hard run and he would be safe with Hilda!
He looked up sideways at Jem, who was beating his drum and blowing his pipes, with his eyes on the lower and upper windows. Bob's head was inside theshow, and both were in front and not thinking of him just then.
Dandy stopped, turned round upon the unwashed children behind, looked wistfully up at them, as much as to say, 'Don't tell,' and then bolted at the top of his speed.
There was a shrill cry from the children at once of 'Oh, Mr. Punch, sir, please—your dawg's a-runnin' away from yer!' and angry calls to return from the two men. Jem even made an attempt to pursue him, but the drum was too much in his way, and a small dog is not easily caught at the best of times when he takes it into his head to run away. So he gave it up sulkily.
Meanwhile Dandy ran on, till the shouts behind died away. Once an errand boy, struck by the parti-coloured frill round the dog's neck, tried to stop him, but he managed to slip past him and run out into the middle of the road, and kept on blindly, narrowly escaping being run over several times by tradesmen's carts.
And at last, panting and exhausted, he reached the well-remembered gate, out of which he had marched so defiantly, it seemed long ages ago.
The railings were covered with wire netting inside, as he knew, but fortunately some one had left the gate open, and he pattered eagerly down the area steps feeling safe and at home at last.
The kitchen door was shut, but the window wasnot, and, as the sill was low, he contrived to scramble up somehow and jump into the kitchen, where he reckoned upon finding friends to protect him.
But he found it empty, and looking strangely cold and desolate; only a small fire was smouldering in the range, instead of the cheerful blaze he remembered there, and he could not find the cook—an especial patroness of his—anywhere.
He scampered up into the hall, making straight for the morning-room, where he knew he should find Hilda curled up in one of the arm-chairs with a book.
But that room was empty too—the shutters were up, and the half-light which streamed in above them showed a dreary state of confusion: the writing-table was covered with a sheet and put away in a corner, the chairs were piled up on the centre table, the carpet had been taken up and rolled under the sideboard, and there was a faint warm smell of flue and dust and putty in the place.
He pattered out again, feeling puzzled and a little afraid, and went up the bare stone staircase to find Hilda in one of the upper rooms, perhaps in the nursery.
But the upper rooms, too, were all bare and sheeted and ghostly, and, higher up, the stairs were spotted with great stars of whitewash, and there were ladders and planks on which strange men in dirty white blouses were talking and joking a great deal,and doing a little whitewashing now and then, when they had time for it.
Their voices echoed up and down the stairs with a hollow noise that scared him, and he was afraid to venture any higher. Besides, he knew by this time somehow that Hilda, her father and mother, all the friends he had counted upon seeing again, would not be found in any part of that house.
It was the same house, though stripped and deserted, but all the life and colour and warmth had gone out of it; and he ran here and there, seeking for them in vain.
He picked his way forlornly down to the hall again, and there he found a mouldy old woman with a duster pinned over her head and a dustpan and brush in her hand; for, unhappily for him, the family, servants and all, had gone away some days before into the country, and this old woman had been put into the house as caretaker.
She dropped her brush and pan with a start as she saw him, for she was not fond of dogs.
'Why, deary me,' she said morosely, 'if it hasn't give me quite a turn. However did the nasty little beast get in? a-gallivantin' about as if the 'ole place belonged to him.'
Dandy sat up and begged. In the old days he would not have done such a thing for any servant below a cook (who was always worth being polite to), but he felt a very reduced and miserable little animalindeed just then, and he thought she might be able to take him to Hilda.
But the charwoman's only idea was to get rid of him as quickly as possible.
'Why, if it ain't a Toby dawg!' she cried, as her dim old eyes caught sight of his frill. Here, you get out; you don't belong 'ere!'
And she took him up by the scruff of the neck and went to the front door. As she opened it, a sound came from the street outside which Dandy knew only to well: it was the long-drawn squeak of Mr. Punch.
'That's where he come from, I'll bet a penny,' cried the caretaker, and she went down the steps and called over the gate, 'Hi, master, you don't happen to have lost your Toby dawg, do you? Is this him?'
The man with the drum came up—it was Jem himself; and thereupon Dandy was ignominiously handed over the railings to him, and delivered up once more to the hard life he had so nearly succeeded in shaking off.
He had a severe beating when they got him home, as a warning to him not to rebel again; and he never did try to run away a second time. Where was the good of it? Hilda was gone he did not know where, and the house was a home no longer.
So he went patiently about with the show, a dismal little dog-captive, the dullest little Toby that ever delighted a street audience; so languid and listless attimes that Mr. Punch was obliged to rap him really hard on the head before he could induce him to take the slightest notice of him.
But in spite of all this, he made the people laugh; most, perhaps, at night, when the show was lit up by a flaring can of paraffin, and he sat with his feet in Punch's coffin, howling dolefully at the melancholy strains of Jem's pipes, which Dandy always found too much for his feelings.
It was winter time, about a fortnight after Christmas, and the night was snowy and slushy outside, though warm enough in the kitchen of a big Belgravian house. The kitchen was crowded, a stream of waiters and gorgeous powdered footmen and smart maids was perpetually coming and going; in front of the fire a tired little terrier, with a shabby frill round his neck, was basking in the blaze, and near him sat a little dirty-faced man with a red beard, who was being listened to with some attention by a few of the upper servants, who were enjoying a moment's leisure.
'Yes,' he was saying, 'I've been in the purfession a sight o' years now, but I don't know as I ever heard on a Punch's show like me and my mate's bein' engaged for a reg'lar swell evenin' party afore. It shows, to my mind, as public taste is a-coming round—it ain't quite so low as formerly.'
The little man was Jem; and he, with his partnerBob, and Dandy, were in the house owing to an eccentric notion of its master, who happened to have a taste for experiments.
He agreed with many who consider that some kind of amusement in the intervals of dancing is welcome to children; but it was one of his ideas too that they must be getting a little bored by the inevitable lecture with the dissolving views, and find a conjuror (even after seeing him several times in a fortnight) as a rule more bewildering than amusing; although as a present-producing animal, the last has his compensations.
He was curious to see whether the drama of Punch and Judy had quite lost its old power to please. He could easily have hired an elegant and perfectly refined form of the entertainment from some of the fashionable toy-shops or 'universal providers,' only unfortunately in these improved versions much of the original fun is often found to have been refined away.
So he had decided upon introducing the original Mr. Punch from his native streets and in his natural uncivilised state, and Jem and Bob chanced to be the persons selected to exhibit him.
'Juveniles is all alike,' observed the butler, who, having been commissioned to engage the showmen, condescended to feel a fatherly interest in the affair; ''igh or low, there's nothing pleases 'em more than seeing one party a-fetching another party a thunderin'good whack over the 'ead. That's where, in my opinion, all these pantomimes makes a mistake. There's too much bally and music 'all about 'em and not 'arf enough buttered slide and red-'ot poker.'
'There's plenty of 'ead whackin' inourshow,' said Jem, with some pride, 'for my partner, you see, he don't find as the dialogue come as fluid to him as he could wish for, so he cuts a deal of it, and what ain't squeakin' is mostly stick—like a cheap operer.'
'Your little dog seems very wet and tired,' said a pretty housemaid, bending down to pat Dandy, as he lay stretched out wearily at her feet. 'Would he eat a cake if I got one for him?'
'He ain't, not to say, fed on cakes as a general thing,' said Jem drily, 'but you can try him, miss, and thankee.'
But Dandy only half raised his head and rejected the cake languidly—he was very comfortable there in the warm firelight, and the place made him feel as if he were back in his own old kitchen, but he was too tired to be hungry.
'He won't hardly look at it,' said the housemaid compassionately. 'I don't think he can be well.'
'Well!' said Jem. 'He'swell enough; that's all his contrariness, that is. The fact is, he thinks hisself a deal too good for the likes of us, he do—thinks he ought to be kep' on chickin in a droring-room!' he sneered, wasting his satire on the unconscious Dandy.
'I tell you what it is, miss: that there dawg's 'artain't in his business—he reg'lar looks down on the 'ole concern, thinks itlow! Why, I see 'im from the werry fust a-turnin' up his nose at it, and it downright set me against him. Give me a Toby as takes a interest in the drama! The last but one as we had, afore him, now,heused to look on from start to finish, and when Punch went and 'anged Jack Ketch, why, that dawg used to bark and jump about as pleased as Punch 'isself, and he'd go in among the crowd too and fetch back the babby as Punch pitched out o' winder, as tender with it as a Newfunland! And he warn't like the general run of Tobies neither, for he got quite thick with the Punch figger—thought a deal on 'im, he did—and if you'll believe me, when I 'ad to get the figger a noo 'ead and costoom, it broke the dawg's 'art—he pined away quite rapid. But this 'ere one wouldn't turn a 'air if the 'ole company went to blazes together!'
Here Bob, who had been setting up the show in one of the rooms, came into the kitchen, looking rather uneasy at finding himself in such fine company, and Dandy was spared further upbraidings, as he was called upon to follow the pair upstairs.
They went up into a large handsome room, where at one end there were placed rows of rout seats and chairs, and at the other the homely old show, seeming oddly out of place in its new surroundings.
Poor draggled Dandy felt more ashamed of it and himself than ever, and he was glad to get awayunder its ragged hangings and lie still by Bob's dirty boots till he was wanted.
And then there was the sound of children's voices and laughter as they all came trooping in, with a crisp rustle of delicate dresses and a scent of hothouse flowers and kid gloves, that reached Dandy where he lay: it reminded him of evenings long ago when Hilda had had parties, and he had been washed and combed and decked out in ribbons for the occasion, and children had played with him and given him nice things to eat—they had generally disagreed with him, but now he could only remember the pleasure and petting of it all.
He would not be petted any more! Presently these children would see him smoking a pipe and being familiar with that low Punch. They would laugh at him too—they always did—and Dandy, like most dogs, hated being laughed at, and never took it as a compliment.
The host's experiment was evidently a complete success: the children, even the mostblasés, who danced the newest valse step and thought pantomines vulgar, were delighted to meet an old friend so unexpectedly. A good many had often yearned to see the whole show right through from beginning to end, and chance or a stern nurse had never permitted it. Now their time had come, and Mr. Punch, in spite of his lamentable shortcomings in every relation of life, was received with the usual uproarious applause.
At last the hero called for his faithful dog Toby, as a distraction after the painful domestic scenes, in which he had felt himself driven to throw his child out of window and silence the objections of his wife by becoming a widower, and accordingly Dandy was caught up and set on the shelf by his side.
The sudden glare hurt his eyes, and he sat there blinking at the audience with a pitiful want of pride in his dignity as Dog Toby.
He tried to look as if he didn't know Punch, who was doing all he could to catch his eye, for his riotous 'rootitoot' made him shiver nervously, and long to get away from the whole thing and lie down somewhere in peace.
Jem was scowling up at him balefully. 'I know'd that 'ere dawg would go and disgrace hisself,' he was saying to himself. 'When I get him to myself, he shall catch it for this!'
Dandy was able to see better now, and he found, as he had guessed, that here was not one of his usual audiences—no homely crowd of loitering errand boys, smirched maids-of-all-work, and ragged children jostling and turning their grinning white faces up to him.
There were children here too—plenty of them—but children at their best and daintiest, and looking as if untidiness and quarrels were things unknown to them—though possibly they were not. The laughter, however, was much the same as he was accustomedto, more musical perhaps, and pleasanter to hear, but quite as hearty and unrestrained—they were laughing athim, and he hung his head abashed.
But all at once he forgot his shame, though he did not remember Mr. Punch a bit the more for that; he ran backwards and forwards on his ledge, sniffing and whining, wagging his tail and giving short piteous barks in a state of the wildest excitement. The reason of it was this: near the end of the front row he saw a little girl who was bending eagerly forward with her pretty grey eyes wide open and a puzzled line on her forehead.
Dandy knew her at the very first glance. It was Hilda, looking more like a fairy princess than ever.
She knew him almost as soon, for her clear voice rang out above the general laughter. 'Oh, that isn't Toby—he's my own dog, my Dandy, that I lost! It is really; let him come to me, please do! Don't you see how badly he wants to?'
There was a sudden surprised silence at this—even Mr. Punch was quiet for an instant; but as soon as Dandy heard her voice he could wait no longer, and crouched for a spring.
'Catch the dog, somebody, he's going to jump!' cried the master of the house, more amused than ever, from behind.
Jem was too sulky to interfere, but some good-natured grown-up person caught the trembling dog just in time to save him from a broken leg, or worse,and handed him to his delighted little mistress; and I think the frantic joy which Dandy felt as he was clasped tight in her loving arms once more and covered her flushed face with his eager kisses more than made up for all he had suffered.
Hilda scornfully refused to have anything to do with Jem, who tried hard to convince her she was mistaken. She took her recovered favourite to her hostess.
'He really is mine!' she assured her earnestly; and he doesn't want to be a Toby, I'm sure he doesn't: see how he trembles when that horrid man comes near. Dear Mrs. Lovibond, please tell them I'm to have him!'
And of course Hilda carried her point, for the showmen were not unwilling, after a short conversation with the master of the house, to give up their rights in a dog who would never be much of an ornament to their profession, and was out of health into the bargain.
Hilda held Dandy, all muddy and draggled as he was, fast in her arms all through the remainder of the performance, as if she was afraid Mr. Punch might still claim him for his own; and the dog lay there in measureless content. The hateful squeak made him start and shiver no more; he was too happy to howl at Jem's dismal pipes and drum: they had no terrors for him any more.
'I think I should like to go home now,' she saidto her hostess, when Mr. Punch had finally retired. 'Dandy is so excited; feel how his heart beats, just there, you know; he ought to be in bed, and I want to tell them all at home so much!'
She resisted all despairing entreaties to stay, from several small partners who felt life a blank after she had gone—till supper came; and so her carriage was called, and she and Dandy drove home in it together once more.
'Dandy, you're very quiet,' she said once, as they bowled easily and swiftly along. 'Aren't you going to tell me you're glad to be mine again?'
But Dandy could only wag his tail feebly and look up in her face with an exhausted sigh. He had suffered much and was almost worn out; but rest was coming to him at last.
As soon as the carriage had stopped and the door was opened, Hilda ran in, breathless with excitement.
'Oh, Parker, look!' she cried to the maid in the hall, 'Dandy is found—he's here!'
The maid took the lifeless little body from her, looked at it for a moment under the lamp, and turned away without speaking. Then she placed it gently in Hilda's arms again.
'Oh, Miss Hilda, didn't you see?' she said, with a catch in her voice. 'Don't take on, now; but it's come too late—poor little dog, he's gone!'
T
he Consul Duilius was entering Rome in triumph after his celebrated defeat of the Carthaginian fleet at Mylæ. He had won a great naval victory for his country with the first fleet that it had ever possessed—which was naturally a gratifying reflection, and he would have been perfectly happy now, if he had only been a little more comfortable.
But he was standing in an extremely rickety chariot, which was crammed with his nearer relations and a few old friends, to whom he had been obliged to send tickets. At his back stood a slave who held a heavy Etruscan crown on the Consul's head, and whenever he thought his master was growing conceited, threw in the reminder that he was only a man after all—a liberty which at any other time he might have had good reason to regret.
Then the large Delphic wreath, which Duilius wore as well as the crown, had slipped down over one eye and was tickling his nose, while—as both his hands were occupied, one with a sceptre, the other with a laurel bough, and he had to hold on tightly to the rail of the chariot whenever it jolted—there was nothing to do but suffer in silence.
They had insisted, too, upon painting him a beautiful bright red all over, and though it made him look quite new, and very shining and splendid, he had his doubts at times whether it was altogether becoming, and particularly, whether he would ever be able to get it off again.
But these were but trifles after all, and nothing compared with the honour and glory of it! Was not everybody straining to catch a glimpse of him? Did not even the spotted and skittish horses which drew the chariot repeatedly turn round to gaze upon his vermilioned features? As Duilius remarked this, he felt that he was, indeed, the central personage inall this magnificence, and that, on the whole, he liked it.
He could see the beaks of the ships he had captured, bobbing up and down in the middle distance; he could see the white bulls destined for sacrifice entering completely into the spirit of the thing, and redeeming the procession from any monotony by occasionally bolting down a back street, or tossing on their gilded horns some of the flamens who were walking solemnly in front of them.
He could hear, too, above five distinct brass bands, the remarks of his friends as they predicted rain, or expressed a pained surprise at the smallness of the crowd and the absence of any genuine enthusiasm; and he caught the general purport of the very offensive ribaldry circulated at his own expense among the brave legions that brought up the rear.
This was merely the usual course of things on such occasions, and a great compliment when properly understood, and Duilius felt it to be so. In spite of his friends, and the red paint, and the familiar slave, in spite of the extreme heat of the weather and his itching nose, he told himself that this—and this alone—was worth living for.
And it was a painful reflection to him that, after all, it would only last a day: he could not go on triumphing like this for the remainder of his natural life—he would not be able to afford it on his moderateincome; and yet—and yet—existence would fall woefully flat after so much excitement.
It may be supposed that Duilius was naturally fond of ostentation and notoriety, but this was far from being the case; on the contrary, at ordinary times his disposition was retiring and almost shy; but his sudden success had worked a temporary change in him, and in the very flush of triumph he found himself sighing to think that, in all human probability, he would never go about with trumpeters and trophies, with flute-players and white oxen, any more in his whole life.
And then he reached the Porta Triumphalis, where the chief magistrates and the Senate awaited them, all seated upon spirited Roman-nosed chargers, which showed a lively emotion at the approach of the procession, and caused some of their riders to dismount, with as much affectation of method and design as their dignity enjoined and the nature of the occasion permitted.
There Duilius was presented with the freedom of the City and an address, which last he put in his pocket, as he explained, to read at home.
And then an Ædile informed him in a speech, during which he twice lost his notes and had to be prompted by a lictor, that the grateful Republic, taking into consideration the Consul's distinguished services, had resolved to disregard expense, and on that auspicious day to give him whatever reward hemight choose to demand—'in reason,' the Ædile added cautiously, as he quitted his saddle with an unexpectedness which scarcely seemed intentional.
Duilius was naturally a little overwhelmed by such liberality, and, like everyone else favoured suddenly with such an opportunity, was quite incapable of taking complete advantage of it.
For a time he really could not remember in his confusion anything he would care for at all, and he thought it might look mean to ask for money.
At last he recalled his yearning for a Perpetual Triumph, but his natural modesty made him moderate, and he could not find courage to ask for more than a fraction of the glory that now attended him.
So, not without some hesitation, he replied that they were exceedingly kind, and since they left it entirely to his discretion, he would like—if they had no objection—he would like a flute-player to attend him whenever he went out.
Duilius very nearly asked for a white bull as well; but, on second thoughts, he felt it might lead to inconvenience, and there were many difficulties connected with the proper management of such an animal; the Consul, from what he had seen that day, felt that it would be imprudent to trust himself in front of the bull—while, if he walked behind, he might be mistaken for a cattle-driver, which would be odious. And so he gave up that idea, and contented himself with a simple flute-player.
The Senate, visibly relieved by so very unassuming a request, granted it with positive effusion; Duilius was invited to select his musician, and chose the biggest, after which the procession moved on through the Arch and up the Capitoline Hill, while the Consul had time to remember things he would have liked even better than a flute-player, and to suspect dimly that he might have made rather an ass of himself.
That night Duilius was entertained at a supper given at the public expense; he went out with the proud resolve to show his sense of the compliment paid him by scaling the giddiest heights of intoxication. The Romans of that day only drank wine and water at their festivals, but it is astonishing how inebriated a person of powerful will can become—even on wine and water—if he only gives his mind to it. And Duilius, being a man of remarkable determination, returned from that hospitable board particularly drunk; the flute-player saw him home, however, helped him to bed, though he could not induce him to take off his sandals, and lulled him to a heavy slumber by a selection from the popular airs of the time.
So that the Consul, although he awoke late next day with a bad headache and a perception of the vanity of most things, still found reason to congratulate himself upon his forethought in securing so invaluable an attendant, and planned, rather hopefully,sundry little ways of making him useful about the house.
As the subsequent history of this great naval commander is examined with the impartiality that becomes the historian, it is impossible to be blind to the melancholy fact that, in the first flush of his elation, Duilius behaved with an utter want of tact and taste that must have gone far to undermine his popularity, and proved a source of much gratification to his friends.
Hewoulduse that flute-player everywhere—he overdid the thing altogether: for example, he used to go out to pay formal calls, and leave the flute-player in the hall, tootling to such an extent that at last his acquaintances were forced in self-defence to deny themselves to him.
When he attended worship at the temples, too, he would bring the flute-player with him, on the flimsy pretext that he could assist the choir during service; and it was the same at the theatres, where Duilius—such was his arrogance—actually would not take a box unless the manager admitted his flute-player to the orchestra and guaranteed him at least one solo between the acts.
And it was the Consul's constant habit to strut about the Forum with his musician executing marches behind him, until the spectacle became so utterly ridiculous that even the Romans of that age, who were as free from the slightest taint of humour as aself-respecting nation can possibly be, began to notice something peculiar.
But the day of retribution dawned at last. Duilius worked the flute so incessantly that the musician's stock of airs was very soon exhausted, and then he was naturally obliged to blow them all through once more.
The excellent Consul had not a fine ear, but even he began to hail the fiftieth repetition of 'Pugnare nolumus,' for instance—the great national peace anthem of the period—with the feeling that he had heard the same tune at least twice before, and preferred something slightly fresher, while others had taken a much shorter time in arriving at the same conclusion.
The elder Duilius, the Consul's father, was perhaps the most annoyed by it; he was a nice old man in his way—the glass and china way—but he was a typical old Roman, with a manly contempt for pomp, vanity, music, and the fine arts generally.
So that his son's flute-player, performing all day in the court-yard, drove the old gentleman nearly mad, until he would rush to the windows and hurl the lighter articles of furniture at the head of the persistent musician, who, however, after dodging them with dexterity, affected to treat them as a recognition of his efforts, and carried them away gratefully to sell.
Duilius senior would have smashed the flute, onlyit was never laid aside for a single instant, even at meals; he would have made the player drunk and incapable, but he was a member of theManus Spei, and he would with cheerfulness have given him a heavy bribe to go away, if the honest fellow had not proved absolutely incorruptible.
So he could only sit down and swear, and then relieve his feelings by giving his son a severe thrashing, with threats to sell him for whatever he might fetch: for, in the curious conditions of ancient Roman society, a father possessed both these rights, however his offspring might have distinguished himself in public life.
Naturally, Duilius did not like the idea of being put up to auction, and he began to feel that it was slightly undignified for a Roman general who had won a naval victory and been awarded a first-class Triumph to be undergoing corporal punishment daily at the hands of an unflinching parent, and accordingly he determined to go and expostulate with his flute-player.
He was beginning to find him a nuisance himself, for all his old shy reserve and unwillingness to attract attention had returned to him; he was fond of solitude, and yet he could never be alone; he was weary of doing everything to slow music, like the bold bad man in a melodrama.
He could not even go across the street to purchase a postage-stamp without the flute-player comingstalking out after him, playing away like a public fountain; while, owing to the well-known susceptibility of a rabble to the charm of music, the disgusted Consul had to take his walks abroad at the head of Rome's choicest scum.
Duilius, with a lively recollection of these inconveniences, would have spoken very seriously indeed to his musician, but he shrank from hurting his feelings by the plain truth. He simply explained that he had not intended the other to accompany himalways, but only on special occasions; and, while professing the sincerest admiration for his musical proficiency, he felt, as he said, unwilling to monopolise it, and unable to enjoy it at the expense of a fellow-creature's rest and comfort.
Perhaps he put the thing a little too delicately to secure the object he had in view, for the musician, although he was obviously deeply touched by such unwonted consideration, waived it aside with a graceful fervour that was quite irresistible.
He assured the Consul that he was only too happy to have been selected to render his humble tribute to the naval genius of so eminent a commander; he would not admit that his own rest and comfort were in the least affected by his exertions, for, being naturally fond of the flute, he could, he protested, perform upon it continuously for whole days without fatigue. And he concluded by pointing out very respectfully that for the Consul to dispense, even to asmall extent, with an honour decreed (at his own particular request) by the Republic, would have the appearance of ingratitude, and expose him to the gravest suspicions. After which he rendered the ancient love chant 'Ludus idem, ludus vetus,' with singular sweetness and expression.
Duilius felt the force of his arguments: Republics are proverbially forgetful, and he was aware that it might not be safe, even for him, to risk offending the Senate.
So he had nothing to do but just go on, and be followed about by the flute-player, and castigated by his parent in the old familiar way, until he had very little self-respect left.
At last he found a distraction in his care-laden existence—he fell deeply in love. But even here a musical Nemesis attended him, to his infinite embarrassment, in the person of his devoted follower. Sometimes Duilius would manage to elude him and slip out unseen to some sylvan retreat, where he had reason to hope for a meeting with the object of his adoration. He generally found that in this expectation he had not deceived himself; but always, just as he had found courage to speak of the passion that consumed him, a faint tune would strike his ear from afar, and, turning his head in a fury, he would see his faithful flute-player striding over the fields in pursuit of him with unquenchable ardour.
He gave in at last, and submitted to the necessityof speaking all his tender speeches 'through music.' Claudia did not seem to mind it, perhaps finding an additional romance in being wooed thus, and Duilius himself, who was not eloquent, found that the flute came in very well at awkward pauses in the conversation.
Then they were married, and, as Claudia played very nicely herself upon thetibiæ, she got up musical evenings, when she played duets with the flute-player, which Duilius, if he had only had a little more taste for music, might have enjoyed immensely.
As it was, beginning to observe for the first time that the musician was far from uncomely, he forbade the duets. Claudia wept and sulked, and Claudia's mother said that Duilius was behaving like a brute, and she was not to mind him; but the harmony of their domestic life was broken, until the poor Consul was driven to take long country walks in sheer despair, not because he was fond of walking, for he hated it, but simply to keep the flute-player out of mischief.
He was now debarred from all other society, for his old friends had long since cut him dead whenever he chanced to meet them. 'How could he expect people to stop and talk,' they asked indignantly, 'when there was that confounded fellow blowing tunes down the backs of their necks all the time?'
Duilius had had enough of it himself, and felt this so strongly that one day he took his flute-player along walk through a lonely wood, and, choosing a moment when his companion had played 'Id omnes faciunt' till he was somewhat out of breath, he turned on him suddenly. When he left the lonely wood he was alone, and somewhere in the undergrowth lay a broken flute, and near it something which looked as if it might once have been a musician.
The Consul went home and sat there waiting for the deed to become generally known. He waited with a certain uneasiness, because it was impossible to tell how the Senate might take the thing, or the means by which their vengeance would declare itself.
And yet his uneasiness was counterbalanced by a delicious relief: the State might disgrace, banish, put him to death even, but he had got rid of slow music for ever; and as he thought of this, the stately Duilius would snap his fingers and dance with secret delight.
All disposition to dance, however, was forgotten upon the arrival of lictors bearing an official missive. He looked at it for a long time before he dared to break the big seal and cut the cord which bound the tablets which might contain his doom.
He did it at last, and smiled with relief as he began to read; for the decree was courteously, almost affectionately, worded. The Senate, considering (or affecting to consider) the disappearance of the flute-player a mere accident, expressed their formal regret at the failure of the provision made in his honour.
Then, as he read on, Duilius dashed the tablets into small fragments, and rolled on the ground, and tore his hair, and howled: for the Senatorial decree concluded by a declaration that, in consideration of his brilliant exploits, the State thereby placed at his disposal two more flute-players, who, it was confidently hoped, would survive the wear and tear of their ministrations longer than the first.
Duilius retired to his room and made his will, taking care to have it properly signed and attested. Then he fastened himself in, and when they broke down the door next day, they found a lifeless corpse, with a strange sickly smile upon its pale lips.
No one in Rome quite made out the reason of this smile, but it was generally thought to denote the gratification of the deceased at the idea of leaving his beloved ones in comfort, if not luxury; for, though the bulk of his fortune was left to Carthaginian charities, he had had the forethought to bequeath a flute-player apiece to his wife and mother-in-law.
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