AT Big Timber Professor Thunder's Museum of Marvels had run for several consecutive hours to satisfactory business, and was now well on its way to The Mills, where a great day was expected in view of some local festivity that meant a general holiday for the mill hands, and a bush carousal.
The caravan was drawn up for tea in the moonlit bush by Howlet's jinker track. A camp-fire blazed in the end of a butt under a wide-branching gum. The Professor lay at a distance—for the night was warm—smoking on the crisp grass. The Living Skeleton crouched near, embracing his lean knees, staring into the fire, thinking fondly of his absent wife and family, a furtive tear lurking in the hollow of his cheek, for Matty Cann's absurd sentimentality made him a failure as a vagabond. Nickie fussed about gallantly, assisting Madame Marve and little Miss Thunder, who were busy spreading papers for the evening meal.
Professor Thunder had in Madame Marve a perfect wife for a showman. In addition to her value as the Egyptian Mystic, a wonder-worker, and teller of for tunes, she was chief cook and housekeeper for the whole caravan, but she had a flirtatious disposition, and the attentions Nicholas Crips offered in his unprofessional moments were received in a spirit of frivolous appreciation that disturbed the boss showman's complacency at times.
"Less of it. Less of it, my boy!" was his deep throated exhortation on such occasions.
All the members of the company had to take a hand in the hard graft and menial tasks incidental to the upkeep, management and movement of the show, and neither professional etiquette nor artistic pride could rescue Nicholas Crips from the vulgar task of preparing comestibles for the monkeys. But Madame was certainly the most useful artist on Professor Thunder's salary list, a document preserved with much pride, to be exhibited in bars and such public places for purposes of advertisement, and which represented the Egyptian Mystic as receiving £30 per week. On the salary list Bonypart, the Living Skeleton, was rated at £15 per week. He actually received twenty-shillings and his keep.
"Professional usage, my boy—professional usage!" explained the celebrated entrepreneur when Matty Cann drew attention to the discrepancy. "It's always done in the theatrical business. Bless you, you don't think we pay our Sarah Bernhardts, and our Cinquevallis, and our Paderewskis and our Peggy Prydes those enormous salaries that get into the papers. No; no, we couldn't do it, but we are content to let it be thought we do. It impresses our public, Bonypart—it impresses our public, my boy."
Madame Marve produced bread, butter, pannikins, and the familiar necessities, brought forward the usual boiled leg of mutton on a lordly dish, large, fat and steaming like a laundry.
"Encore, encore!" cried the Professor.
"Hear, hear!" applauded Nickie, clapping vigorously. Matty Cann even ventured an expression of appreciation.
Madame Marve placed the mutton for the carver, and bowed low to the right and left, picked up an imaginary bouquet, and threw three kisses to hypothetical "gods."
"Come, come, Bony," she said, patting the Living Skeleton on the back, "buck up, man. If my old man couldn't think of me for ten minutes without snivelling, I'd have a divorce."
Matty Cann smiled wanly. He had no great cause to "buck up," his share of the boiled leg would be very small indeed and entirely knuckle, the Professor holding that the knuckle end was not fat-producing.
"It's Jane's birthday this day week, an' little Mat'll be two year old the day after. I was wonderin' if I could get a day off t' visit me fam'ly?" said Matty.
"And fat up over-eating yourself," said Thunder. "Not much, my boy!"
Matty groaned. "I give you me word I'd eat nothin' but ship's biscuit," he pleaded.
"Poor old Bony," said the Egyptian Mystic. "It's a pity your missus ain't a bit of a freak, so as we could have her along. Now, if she could eat fire we might find a place for her. Fire-eaters are very popular. I suppose she couldn't learn to eat fire, Bony?"
The Living Skeleton shook his head gloomily over his poor meal. "I'm afraid she couldn't," he said. "Jane ain't got any gifts."
The meal was finished, and the utensils were washed and restored to the caravan cupboard, a zinc-lined packing case. Professor Thunder was down on his back on the crisp grass again, smoking. He was feeling good, and opened his heart.
"We'll top off with a touch of old Jamaica, Nickie, my boy," he said."There's a bottle in the box-seat. You might lead her out."
Nickie needed no second invitation. He sprang up with unaccustomed alacrity, and passed out of the circle of light into the bush darkness. He found the bottle in the locker under the driving seat, and stepping down from the vehicle turned again towards the fire. The extraordinary change in the peaceful scene he had just left flashed upon him with the vividness of a tableau in melodrama The gifted members of Professor Thunder's world company were no longer lounging carelessly on the grass, they stood erect, grouped together, their faces, tense with fear and amazement, showing whitey-yellow in the firelight, their hands thrown above their heads. Facing them on the other side of the fire, with his profile to Nicholas Crips, was a short, stoutly-built man, in a coarse blue shirt and corduroy riding pants, with a white handkerchief tied loosely about his neck. A fine chestnut horse stood behind him. The rein was looped over his arm. In his right hand this man held a long, business-like Colt's revolver pointed at the group before him.
It was a fine picture, intensely dramatic, it amazed Nickie, and brought him up short with a gasp, but it did not appeal to him as an artist particularly. He stepped sharply into cover of a gum butt. His hand went instinctively to his breast where, in a small chamois bag next his skin, he carried a certain treasure the care of which was the one real concern of his present life.
"See here," said the gentleman with the long revolver, "the first of you, man, woman or child, that stirs a finger or utters a yelp gets lead poisonin'. Understand?" He looked round. "This is the whole band?" he said.
Professor Thunder nodded his head.
"Yes," said the intruder, "I was at your show at Big Timber, Professor, an' I took trouble t' size up the strength of the crowd. I guessed it would be an easy thing, and it is."
"Who are you?" asked the celebrated entrepreneur, much distressed to find himself in a theatrical situation that was painfully real.
"Don't ask questions of yer betters, Professor, an' you won't get hurt. Howsomever, yer bound t' hear at The Mills all about Dan Heeley, so I don't mind admittin' I'm little Danny."
"Heeley!" gasped Madame Marve, "the man that shot Hollander, the man that's been sticking up the banks?"
Heeley's brow darkened.
"Precisely, missus," he said; "the man the Gov' mint offers £250 quid for, cash on delivery." He turned again to Professor Thunder. "I noticed you was doin' pretty good at Big Timber, mate," he said, "and I thought I'd follow on and pick up a little loose change. Fact is, I want your cash box, Perfessor, and any little articles of value you don't happen to be needin' for the moment."
"I—I've got next to nothing," faltered Thunder. "Most of my takings went in expenses."
Mat Heeley's revolver hand became rigid, his grim mouth, tightened, his chin set itself in prognathous ugliness.
"You'll send your little girl for that cash box, Professor," he said coldly, "and you'll tell her to gather up any bits and pieces of jewellery and such like as would please me, and if the collection isn't a good one I'll maybe blow an arm off you, jist as a mark of my displeasure. As for the rest, if you ain't good I'll riddle the brain-pan of one of yeh jist to convince the others that I mean business."
Professor Thunder was quite convinced; he had not the slightest doubt but that Daniel meant business. He gave Letitia his keys, and a few words of instruction, and the girl went to the caravan, and presently returned with the Professor's zinc cash box and a chamois-leather bag containing a few rings and chains belonging to himself and Madame.
Dan Heeley placed his revolver to his hand on the stump by his side, and took up the cash box, but the next instant he snatched at his revolver again, and turned it upon a large, ungainly figure, that loped out of the bush, and stood grinning and chattering where the firelight faded into gloom. It was Mahdi the Missing Link, in full dress.
"What's that?" demanded Heeley, fiercely.
The figure leaped about in a foolish way, and rolled on the grass in unwield play. Heeley burst into laughter. "It's that blanky monkey," he said. "D'yeh mean t' say you leave four thousan' quids' worth o' monkey run round loose in the bush like this?"
Mr. Heeley grinned amiably, replaced the revolver on the stump, and turned his attention to the cash box once more. That cash box was decidedly heavy, but the Professor, whose heart had been in his boots at the prospect of a big loss, was now tremulous with hope, and watched the Missing Link anxiously. Mahdi scraped and picked at the grass with a diverting show of monkey antics, sniffed at the boiler in which the leg of mutton had been cooked, and backed away nearer Heeley, with a yowl of consternation as his nose encountered the scalding water. Dan Heeley was diverted, he laughed aloud, but he had a cautious eye on his victims the while, for all he held them cheaply.
Mahdi, the man-monkey, sniffed about the stump, and capered foolishly. He looked with ape-like curiosity at Heeley's horse, then made an impish jump at the animal, grinning and growling savagely. The horse threw up his head, snorted in terror, and pulled back, dragging Heeley with him, broke free, and bolted into the night. Cursing wildly, Heeley ran for his revolver. He ran with his nose on to the barrel of it.
One was there before him—the Missing Link. The revolver was held in Mahdi's shaggy paw, pointed straight at Heeley's head, and the animal gibbered in guttural fury, snarling and showing ugly white fangs. It was a sight to deter the boldest; it shocked Dan Heeley, the Bold Dan Heeley, who had never trembled at the sight of a living thing—when he had the drop on it—and he drew up sharply and recoiled a step.
Then he swore a big black oath, and his right hand went to his hip. It was an unwise action; the Missing Link anticipated the evil intention and fired. A second revolver fell from Mr. Heeley's right hand. Dan's shooting arm was broken.
The Missing Link advanced with movements and howls significant of horrible ferocity. Dan Heeley backed before it, white to the lips. At this point the Professor plucked up courage and advanced upon Heeley.
Dan offered no resistance, his arm was broken, and he was completely paralysed by the insistence of the monster attacking him. Five minutes later Dan, Heeley, the Bold Birragua Boy, was securely tied to a tree, with about three fathoms of inch manila, and the Professor's cash box, with its proper contents increased by certain sums that were illegally Heeley's, was safely bestowed in its locker again.
"What was the price you said the Government had put on your head, Dan, my boy?" asked Professor Thunder. "Two hundred and fifty of the best? It's mine, Daniel."
Heeley made no reply; his frightened eyes were fixed on the man-monkey cowering in the shade, with the revolver tight in its right hand.
"The Missing Link will watch over you to-night, Dan," continued the Professor, jauntily. "He's as strong as ten men, so don't try tricks with him."
But the Professor did not get that £250. At day-break, to Heeley's great amazement, the huge monkey cut him free, and made no attempt to resist his flight. Nicholas Crips had very satisfactory reasons for not being mixed up in a long, legal ceremonial such as the handing of Heeley over to the police would have entailed. Nicholas remembered a certain strange adventure in Bigg's Buildings, and his desire was to give the police of Victoria as wide a berth as the most exclusive officer could possibly long for.
PROFESSOR THUNDER freely admitted that Nickie the Kid was by far the bestMissing Link he had ever met.
"There ain't your equal in the whole profession, my boy," he said, clapping the man-monkey heartily between the shoulder blades, "and if you go on improving your interpretation and developing the character, by the Lord Harry, I believe it'll be worth our while to do a world's tour one of these days."
In consideration of Mahdi's perfections the Professor had twice generously raised his salary by half a-crown a week.
"There isn't a Woolly Man o' the Woods or a Wild Man from Borneo now on the roads' drawing the salary you are, Crips," said the Professor. "Two pounds two and six a week is princely pay for a Missing Link. Let me tell you there are stars playing Romeo and Hamlet that aren't getting such good money, my boy."
Nickie certainly deserved his munificent salary, as he was the best draw in the museum, and was improving the attractiveness of the show weekly, with bright ideas and new schemes for inciting the interest of the Professor's bucolic customers. It was Nickie suggested the idea of a ride through Bullfrog town ship in character.
"I'm afraid, my boy," said the Professor, "it's risky—very risky. You'll be giving the game away one of them days, and once it gets about that Professor Sullivan Thunder's marvellous and only-living Missing Link is a fake, the metropolitan press will be down on me like a ton of bricks, and I'll come to running a Punch and Judy show at baby parties in my old age."
"My dear Professor, have a bit of enterprise," replied the Missing Link, "we are not drawing well! Bullfrog wants waking up. Run out the caravan, and take a turn through the township, with the cornet playing and me riding ahead on the black mare, and we are bound to make an impression. Get through at a good bat, and they won't have time to look twice at the man-monkey before it's all over. Just a dash through and back to the tent, and we can be under cover again before they're fairly out of their houses. I tell you, sir, it will make Bull frog wild with curiosity."
Madame Marve, the Egyptian Mystic, favoured the scheme, and Professor Thunder agreed. The caravan was prepared, and Madame Marve, wearing a much bespangled, but rather seedy, pantomime, fairy costume, stood by the box seat, playing a lively air on the cornet; Professor Thunder, with a flowing mane of hair and a Buffalo Bill rig-out, drove the horses. From the sides of the big vehicle hung highly-coloured posters, while above flared the name of the show in long, red letters.
The black mare Nickie rode was one of the three hired to drag the Museum into Bullfrog. She was a rather spirited little beast, and had shown great perturbation when Mr. Crips, in his full make-up as Mahdi, the Missing Link, approached to mount. Now she cantered ahead at a smart pace, still nervous about the monstrous thing upon her back. The caravan came rattling after, Professor Thunder keeping up a volley of whip cracks, and Madame tooting gaily.
It was early in the day, and the township had lain drowsing in its dust under the shimmer of a great yellow sun till this astonishing invasion struck it, and startled it from its accustomed lethargy. There was a rush to windows and doors, men fell over each other struggling from Harvey's bar, a sudden mutiny arose in the little wooden school, and children swarmed at the windows, and poured pell-mell from the doors. The people of Bullfrog caught only a fleeting glimpse of a huge monkey crouched man-wise on a gaily caparisoned pony, of Madame Marve in her fairy costume, and the gaudy caravan, as the small procession dashed past.
But Constable Cobb, who was drowsing against the shoemaker's doorpost, saw the amazing thing on the horse approaching as in a dream, and professional zeal uppermost in his mind, he dashed into the toad, and grabbed at the rein. The mare, already much distressed, lost her head entirely at this rude intervention of the law, and rearing high on her hind legs as she beat the air with her hoofs, plunged wildly, and then bolted, leaving Constable Cobb on the broad of his back, half stifled in the dust, with the imprint of a horseshoe on his elegant helmet.
The mare did the circuit of Bullfrog at a furious pace, with the Missing Link hanging about her neck, and slinging to her ribs with insistent heels. Never had Bullfrog experienced such a shaking up. People came running in all directions, eager to see this marvellous thing. The township was almost obscured in its own dust, and through the clouds of her own creating came the little mare, scattering the horrified inhabitants, who caught only fleeting glimpses of the huge, hairy creature sprawling in the saddle.
When Nickie at length regained his stirrups, and worked himself into an upright position, he found the mare racing along a rough road between walls of bush, heading towards Tollbar, whence she had come on the previous day.
Nickie the Kid was not expert as an equestrian. So far he had clung to the horse with desperate tenacity, and now that he had recovered his mental grip to some extent he could think of nothing to restrain the animal's wild career, but he did think of the awful possibilities of his position, one of which was an apparent certainty. The horse would carry him back to Tollbar, to its owner's stable, the township would be drawn together by the extraordinary spectacle of a horse bolting through the place mounted by a gigantic monkey, the fraud would be discovered, and then the inhabitants would deal in their own gentle, characteristic way with the man who had been party to Professor Thunder's shocking imposition. Two days earlier Tollbar had patronised the museum.
These cheerful thoughts occupied Nickie's mind while the mare was negotiating about five miles, and wearing much of the wool off Mahdi, and not a little cuticle off Mr. Crips; but he was saved the dread ordeal he anticipated by another disaster. The mare caught a hoof in a rut and came down heavily, and presently Nickie recovered consciousness, lying on his back, blinking at the blue sky, gratified to find that he was not dead.
The mare was out of sight, and the Missing Link was at large in the bush, with a damaged head, a sprained ankle, a cracked rib, and a pain in every limb. He arose and shook some, of the dust off himself, and then limped from the road and sat in the shade of a tree, with his back to the butt, to consider his lamentable situation and feel his injuries.
Nickie's position was certainly an unpleasant one. He could not walk back to Bullfrog, because he would be certain to meet people by the way, and the sight of a Missing Link prowling in the Australian hush might lead to disaster. In any case, the sprained ankle made a five-mile walk impossible. Nickie could not strip off his monkey make-up, because of the very scanty undergarments he possessed.
"What the deuce am I to do now?" groaned the victim, gently chafing his bruises.
He was answered by a shrill scream, an energetic and most piercing feminine yell of terror, and lifting his startled eyes he beheld a young girl, clad after the manner of a settler's daughter, standing a few yards away, staring at him with wild horrified eyes. The girl's fingers were clutching her hair, her face was white, her limbs convulsed, she seemed glued to the spot, incapable of movement, but power of screaming remained with her, and she exerted it to the utmost—she screamed, and screamed, and screamed again, the bush resounded with the echoes of her agonised cries.
For a moment Nickie stared back in blank surprise. It had not struck him that he was the occasion of this frantic demonstration, but presently he realised that a little screaming was excusable in an excitable young lady coming suddenly upon a full-grown missing link drowsing under the gums in her native bush.
Nickie arose, he advanced a step. His intentions were honourable he meant to offer a full explanation, with apologies, but the girl did not wait; at his first movement she swung round and fled through the trees, still screaming.
The Missing Link sat down again with a sigh. Anyhow there must be a residence near, he was not destined to perish in the bush; but the girl would rush home with a shocking tale of some hideous monster in the paddock, her male relations would come to hunt down that monster. Nickie had had experience of such hunters; he remembered that they carried guns, and that they were not disposed to delay shooting in order to argue with a monkey about the sacredness of life.
Mr. Crips had a ready mind, and his peculiar career had taught him the necessity of prompt action. With eager hands he pulled off his monkey skin, rolled it up, and stuffed it into a hollow log, with the head-piece and mask; and then with his singlet he rubbed the make-up off his face, rubbing off a fair amount of hide in his eagerness. After this he set to work tearing up the grass tufts, and creating evidence of a struggle. The blood from a cut in his head came in most useful; he made as big a show as possible with it. Nicholas Crips next lay down amid the ruin he had wrought.
Nickie had not long to wait. About twenty minutes later he saw an elderly man and a youth coming hurriedly through the trees, looking about them eagerly. Each carried a gun. He sat up and beckoned, and they hastened to him, not a little astonished to find a strange man clad only in torn singlet and drawers lying there in the depths of the bush.
"Hullo, mate," said the elder man, "what's amiss?"
Nickie groaned aloud. "Horrible!" he gasped. "Horrible! Horrible!"
The man raised him. "I say, you've been knocked about," he said. "Have you seen anythin'?"
Nickie nodded feebly. "Yes," he said, "a monkey, an orang-outang, or something, as big as a man. An awful brute."
"Well, I'm blowed!" gaspe the man. "Then Nell was right. My daughter came home in a fit; she said a monkey bigger'n me had chased her."
"It's true," murmured Nickie. "It chased me. We had a terrible fight. It tore all my clothes off about a mile and a half back there near the creek. I escaped, and it chased me here, and we fought again. I thought my end had come, when it must have heard you, and it made off through the bush towards the mountain, going like the wind."
"By cripes!" ejaculated the youth in an awed voice.
"Did he hurt yeh much?" asked the man.
"My ankle's sprained, and I've got a broken rib and a cut head," answered Nickie; "but losing my clothes is the worst. What is a man to do without his clothes?"
"You get up to the house, Billy, and bring down my Sunday things," said the settler. "We'll fix you up all right, mister," he added, addressing Nickie the Kid, and Nickie smiled warily, and uttered feeble thanks.
They dressed Nickie and took him up to the house and fed him, and then drove him back to Bullfrog in their spring cart, delivering him into the hands of Madame Marve, who manifested great joy on receiving back the unparalleled Missing Link in fairly good condition.
Nickie had explained to the settler that he believed the orang-outang that attacked him had escaped from Professor Thunder's Museum of Marvels and that he intended claiming damages.
Later in the day Nickie and the Professor drove out and recovered Mahdi's outfit from the hollow log, and that evening the Missing Link was again on view, and exciting much interest, although he sullenly refused to any further demonstration for the edification of the people of Bullfrog.
THE Museum of Marvels was "resting" at Devil's Head. The Professor was resting, personally and particularly, on a stretcher bed in a small, hot, fly-infested room in "The Devil's Head" Hotel, pending the mending of divers injuries sustained in a disaster that put the show temporarily out of action. Thunder did not travel with his own horses, finding it much cheaper to hire a team to pull his caravan from one pitch to another. The pair of bays engaged to tow the museum, and traps and wares from Field Hill to Corner Stone had been so upset by the eccentric conduct of a frenzied inebriate, who fled along the stone road in a woman's nightdress, being pursued by purely imaginary griffins, dodoes, unicorns and dragons, all in primary colours, that they wheeled and bolted with the whole caboodle, and running into a bridge railing upset Professor Thunder and Professor Thunder's Museum of Marvels into Billy's Creek, greatly to the detriment of the show, and to the serious discomfort of the Professor who was pulled from under Ammonia, the gorilla, just when that amusing animal had almost succeeded in stifling him in the slurry for which Billy's Creek was famous.
While the Professor rested and underwent repairs, and whiled his time negotiating for damages with the owner of the horses and the frantic person in the woman's nightdress, Matty Cann, the' Living Skeleton, and Nicholas Crips, the Missing Link, were allowed their liberty. The Living Skeleton went home to the bosom of his affectionate family, with stern instructions to carefully regulate his diet, and Nickie went on to Winyip, sworn to preserve professional secrets, and bound to hold himself in readiness for resumption of duties at a day's notice.
Nickie wore a good suit of store clothes, he bore on his rascally head quite a reputable hat, his linen was fairly meritorious, his boots were above reproach, he wore socks like a man accustomed to luxuries, he was clean-shaven, he jingled money in his pocket. In his varied career Nickie had had ups and downs; true, his "ups" had been brief, but they were frequent enough to keep him almost in touch with respectability. At Winyip, a considerable township in its way, he passed quite easily for a dramatic artist taking rest and change to dissipate brain fag, the result of too studious application to his art.
When the Professor was himself again he called his company together and descended upon Corner Stone. The caravan remained at Corner Stone for a night and a day, and then moved on to Winyip. Nickie the Kid, for some reason of his own, strongly opposed the trip to Winyip; possibly because he was reluctant to appear as a mere man-monkey with a demoralised head and a rudimentary tail in a township in which he had recently figured to great advantage as Crips Nicholas, the eminent Shakespearean actor.
Winyip proved to be an excellent show town and Mahdi, the Missing Link, came in for a good deal of attention, although his performance was more subdued than ordinarily, and he showed little of the actor's natural anxiety to monopolise the limelight, but a local moral reformer wrote to the "Winyip Advertiser and Porkkakeboorabool Standard" enlaring on the shocking action of a depraved showman in keeping this poor heathen, which was "almost a human creature," confined in a cage like a beast of the field. The disputation that followed was kept alive by Professor Thunder.
People flocked to see the wonderful man-monkey, and on the afternoon of the second day came a tall, stern woman of about forty. She was nearly six feet high, her nose was large, her chin small and sliding, and she wore glasses. Across her left arm she nursed a large, shabby umbrella, and her habitual expression was that of one who has discovered a smell of drains.
This big woman was very curious. She peered into every hole and corner, she examined Bonypart, the Living Skeleton, very closely through her glasses, looking critically at his features, and was equally curious with the monkeys. She even inspected Professor Thunder with such minuteness, and with such an air of one who has at last detected a shameful imposition, that at length the celebrated showman exclaimed with some grandeur: "Excuse me, ma'am, but I'm not an exhibit."
"Oh," gasped the female, "I beg your pardon. My name is Martha Spink; I live at 'The Nook.' Do you happen to know a—eh—theatrical person named Nicholas—Crips Nicholas?"
Professor Thunder had learned caution. "I fancy I have heard the name," he said.
"You haven't such a person in your employ?" said the lady.
"No," said the Professor, thoughtfully, as if mentally running over the names of numerous celebrities on his long pay-roll. "No, I am sure there is no artist of that name in my company."
"I'll find him," said Mrs. Spink, decisively, firing up, and making dangerous gestures with her umbrella. "Mark me, I'll find him, and when I do—" The sweep of her bulky gamp nearly knocked Bonypart off his platform.
"Carefully, ma'am, carefully," said the Professor, "you came near breaking a valuable exhibit then. Living Skeletons have to be handled gingerly, madam. I am sure the ruffian deserves all you can give him. May I inquire what villain's work he is guilty of?"
"He's been proposin' marriage, that's what he's been doin'," cried Mrs.Spink. "I'm a widder lady, and he's been proposin' marriage to Me."
"Dangerous, dangerous—very dangerous," said the Professor.
The Living Skeleton looked apprehensively to wards the cage of theMissing Link, and Mahdi growled fiercely and retreated into the shadows.
"He stayed at my house two weeks," continued the widow, "paid nothing for board and residence, but made me an honourable proposal of marriage, and then ran off. But I'll find him."
The Professor was called away to give his scholarly address on the Darwinian hypothesis for the edification of his patrons, and the fierce female hung on the outskirts of the audience, and examined the exhibits suspiciously. When Thunder came to that scale of creation represented by the Missing Link, Nickie exhibited great ferocity, growling and gnashing his teeth in a most terrifying manner, but keeping sedulously to the shadows at the back of the cage. Madame Marve stirred him up with the long stick kept for the purpose, and the Professor dwelt with feeling on the worst features of the animal's character. Mrs. Spink peered with especial eagerness.
Mrs. Martha Spink paid twice for admission before sundown, and at night she came again. She betrayed extraordinary curiosity concerning the characteristics and peculiarities of missing links, and her concern had a powerful effect upon Mahdi. His diffidence was so marked that the Professor was constrained to excuse it in his descriptive address. "The poor animal is afflicted with toothache to-day," he said. "Like the best of us he has his morbid moments."
"S'pose she'll be lookin' yeh up agen t'day, Nickie," whispered theLiving Skeleton through Mahdi's bars next morning.
The Missing Link snorted. "I wish the Professor would bet out of this hole," he said. "If that terrific creature discovers the truth, I am lost."
Nickie had not left the cage all night, preferring to sleep in his skin rather than risk a sudden descent on the part of the enemy.
"What'd yeh do it fer?" said the Skeleton; "a great lath-an'-plaster she-emu like that, too."
"Not having anything else to do, Matthew," moaned the Missing Link. "I always was tender with women."
"Well, yiv gotter look out, ol' man. If she nails yer, yer a gone link, that's er cert."
"For two pins I'd retire from the profession," said Nickie. "It exposes a man to too much temptation."
The lorn widow did not appear that morning. The afternoon passed, and Mrs. Spink had not been heard from. There was a good crowd in at half-past eight, and Professor Thunder was giving his instructive and entertaining description of the life and habits of the Missing Link in the dark jungles of Central Africa. The Link had recovered confidence somewhat. He ventured to show himself at the front of the cage, he capered and gibbered, and at that point where Thunder dwelt upon the courage and fierceness of the man-monkey in fighting for his young, Nickie jumped forward, clawing through the bars, and uttering blood-curling growls.
At that moment his eye fell upon a face that thrust itself forward out of the press; his gaze encountered the eager scrutiny of a grim, green eye, behind glass. It was the eye of Widow Spink.
"It's him," cried the widow. She rushed for ward; she battered at the Missing Link with her umbrella, and the terrified animal retreated to his straw. "You villain!" screamed Mrs. Spink, "you double-dyed, lyin' villain, I've got you!" She was reaching as far as possible through the bars, prodding at the man-monkey, and the audience were gazing in stupid surprise.
"Madam, madam, my dear madam!" expostulated the Professor, "you must not irritate the animals."
He pulled her back from the cage.
"Don't tell me," cried the justly-indignant widow. "I know him I'd know him out of a thousand, robber of the widow and the orphan that he is."
The Professor spoke to her soothingly.
"There, there, madam, do not excite yourself, you'll be all right in the morning."
"Meanin' I'm drunk!" shrieked the widow, raising her gingham threateningly. "I know what I'm talking about. He promised me marriage."
She made another lunge at the Missing Link.
"Yes, he did; he said we'd be married in a fortnight, the villain, andI'll have the law on him."
"Most distressing hallucination," said the Professor, pressing Mrs. Spink through the crowd. "Will nobody take charge of the poor lady?"
He pushed her towards the door, the crowd following, delighted with the unexpected diversion, confident that Mrs. Spink was drunk or mad. The widow retired, fighting, the people pressing her.
"I'll have the law on him," screamed Mrs. Spink. "I'll have a thousand pounds damages for breach of promise. I'll teach him, deceivin' a lone widder, the villain!"
Outside she enlarged upon her wrongs, telling the crowd of the infamous conduct of these actors, who go about the country imposing upon innocence and virtue. She went off, still flourishing her sturdy gamp, and reiterating her determination to have the law on the infamous Missing Link.
"That widow means business, Crips, my boy," said the Professor after the show; "somethin's got to be done. She swears she'll see a lawyer, and she will. Now look here, I can't have my Missing Link dragged into a law suit. If you get sued for breach of promise, you're no good to me, the game's up so far as missing links are concerned, and my show's reputation gone. Is this to be the end of a long and honoured public career? What's to be done?"
Madame Marve, Letitia, Matty Cann, Nickie, and even the educated pig sat in council to consider ways and means of averting the pending catastrophe, and Nickie bore the fierce rebukes showered upon him with proper humbleness. Never was seen a more depressed and humiliated missing link.
The next day was Sunday and in the morning, dressed becomingly in his part as the naturalist and teacher, Professor Thunder called upon the Widow Spink at "The Nook," and held a long consultation with her. As a result of the Professor's arguments, the lady was persuaded to visit the Museum of Marvels and have a private audience with the Missing Link.
The widow said she was going to town to see a lawyer on Monday morning, but agreed to Professor Thunder's proposal, and called on the Missing Link in his cage.
"I think, madam, you will admit that you are mistaken," said the Professor, at the door of the cage, "and will see that you have cast a serious aspersion on the character of an innocent animal and the genuineness of a reputable museum." He stirred up the huge, hairy body lying in the straw in the Missing Link's cage. "If you come inside the creature may attack you, but you are welcome to do so."
Mrs. Spink, after looking closer at the hideous head the Professor lifted out of the straw, and brought close to her own at the back bars, decided not to enter the cage. She had a painful impression that perhaps she was mistaken after all.
"I admit, madam, that we build the animal up to some extent to make him look large. That is a mere showman's trick, and innocent enough in itself, but I am determined to convince you that this is a genuine man-monkey, as your story has done me much mischief in my profession. Pray look closely at the beast."
Mrs. Spink did look closely. There was not the slightest doubt that the animal she beheld, although somewhat faked, was one of the monkey tribe. She confessed her error, she became contrite and tearful, and promised an apology if the Professor would not persist in his threatened action for defamation of character.
"I was told the wretch was seen with your company," said the tearful Mrs.Spink.
When the widow was well out of range, Nickie crept from the tent of theEgyptian Mystic, and breathed a great sigh of relief.
"I shall probably never make love to a widow again," he said, sadly; "they are so ungrateful."
He was dressed in his ordinary clothes, and the creature in the MissingLink's cage sprang towards him spitting and clawing spitefully. It wasAmmonia, the Gorilla, in the Missing Link's skin, padded and faked totwice his size to deceive a poor, weak woman.
"I believe after all we ought to frighten something in the way of compensation out of the gorgon," said Nickie, vengefully. Our reprobate hero was a man who knew no remorse of conscience.
PROFESSOR THUNDER was hurt in his professional pride by the signal failure of his Museum of Marvels in Rabbit township. In the first place, the great impresario had been guilty of a grievous blunder in selecting Rabbit for a two-night's pitch, but things had been going so remarkably well of late, due mainly to the eccentric adventures of the Missing Link, that the boss was getting proud, and was beginning to feel that his astounding galaxy of unparalleled attractions would draw well in the dead centre of the Old Man Plain. Rabbit township was making his error plain to him.
Usually when the caravan bounded into a township, with the little bells on the horses jingling gaily, and Madame Marve, dressed in a somewhat brief and too youthful costume, enthroned on the box seat, playing a rattling tune on the cornet, the people turned out in crowds to welcome it, and the children swarmed, eager for a peep at the hidden mysteries.
It was different at Rabbit township.
The caravan dashed into Rabbit with the customary velocity and the regulation rattle, but Rabbit did not trouble itself.
"Blarst my eyes!" growled the Professor, when the camp was made; "even the dogs didn't bark! What sort of a boneyard is this we've struck?"
As a matter of fact, Rabbit was a moribund township. The rabbits had eaten up the surrounding country, and now they were beginning to eat up the township. So voracious was bunny that when a man went missing it was gloomily concluded that the rabbits had eaten him, and the township took no action, subsiding in despair. Most of the people had left. Those who remained did so because they couldn't afford to shift, or because they were too lazy to go.
Professor Thunder had been doing good business, and his expenses were light. He could afford to play tricks, but he played a foolish prank in trying to amuse Rabbit township. Rabbit was incapable of being amused.
There remained an open hotel at Rabbit, and the Professor called on its proprietor to gather useful information concerning the inhabitants, their tastes and habits. He found Schmitz, the portly proprietor, sprawling on his own bar counter, embracing a bottle of squareface with a loving hug. The two arms of Schmitz caressed the bottle, his cheek was pressed amorously to the cork. The eye of Schmitz was small and round, and seemed to be filled with pink cobweb, his hair was in a state of tumult, and was full of chips, suggesting that he had recently slept on the wood heap. Schmitz had a fierce, red moustache, that looked as if it had been trimmed on a block with an adze.
The publican blinked stupidly at the world-famous showman for a moment, trying to pick him out from a number of unnatural curiosities careering before him, and then he said, decisively: "Ged oud of mein 'ous'."
"My dear fellow," said the Professor, urbanely, "I suppose you will serve me with some little refreshment?"
"Refreshmend?" muttered the landlord. "Refreshmend?" His intellect struggled to grasp the situation. Suddenly it became luminous. "Nein!" he yelled. "I vill nod you mid refreshmend serve! Nein! I keep him all for meinseluf. Ged oud!"
"But, Mr. Schmitz," expostulated the Professor.
"Ged oud of mein 'ous'. I know vot you want, ain't id? You want to buy mein liquer. Veil, I don'd sell some liquer to nopody. Der ain't sufficiency for mieinseluf. Ged oud! Tam you, ged oud kvick!" Schmitz caught up a bottle in quick rage, and dashed it at Professor Thunder.
The Professor pursued his investigations no further. The tent was pitched, the museum was arranged for an afternoon performance, and the unrivalled showman, to whose enterprise Rabbit owed this chance of improving its mind and enlivening its leisure, took his stand outside, and endeavoured to awaken the township to a sense of its opportunities. For three-quarters of an hour he poured forth a stream of eloquence at the top of his pitch. After the first quarter of an hour he was appreciated by a tired dog, which drifted up, and barked at him in a desultory way. Later, he was becoming discouraged when a tattered youth, wearing a hat that nearly engulfed him, came and stared at him open-mouthed, stupidly, silently, for twenty minutes. This youth was the township idiot. Nobody else troubled to come out and see what all the noise was about.
"We're got to shake up the township, Nickie," Thunder said.
"Well, go out and shake it, Professor—I'm tired."
"No, Nickie, you've got to do the shaking. See here, the place is dead. I don't believe it ever heard of Professor Thunder and his world-famous Missing Link; I don't think it has discovered that anything unusual has happened along. You must escape from your cage to-night, and scare the life half out of some of these miserable mummies, then I'll come along and recapture you. That should excite some curiosity, and perhaps bring in money to-morrow'."
Nickie yawned lazily. "Oh, all right," he said, getting back to his straw; "but mind there are no guns. I've an objection to being hunted with guns—it's too wearing."
That night a large, hairy animal of a species hither to unknown at Rabbit, made its way along the deserted main street of the township. The animal walked upright, like a huge monkey, its long hands swung below its knees. Mahdi had not gone a hundred yards when a large, stout man lurched out of the shadow of a tree and fell upon him.
The large, stout man smelt strongly of consumed drink. He clasped the Missing Link to his breast for a moment, then swayed back, holding on with one hand. In the other hand he flourished a bottle.
"Goot day, mein bruder; how are you?" he gurgled. Nickie growled his most terrible growl, and the stranger made some little show of surprise. "Vot is it der madder?" he said. "Blitzen, dot's a peaudiful winter overcoad vot you year mit der summer. Come'n haff er drink." He held the bottle towards Nickie the Kid. It was a bottle of square gin. All kinds of bottles were fascinating to Nickie.
Mahdi faltered. Nickie was very partial to square gin, and although theMissing Link had a proper sense of duty, the inner man was weak.
"Helup vourseluf, Sharlie," said Schmitz.
Nickie helped himself. He helped himself liberally. Schmitz fell on Mahdi's neck, and embraced him freely. "Mein goot friend," he gurgled, "I like you. You shplended fellow. Dot's so, sure. Come mit me, my 'ous' to, und ye make a night mid it." He embraced Nickie again.
"All der same," he said, in a puzzled tone, "I don't know me vy you vear dot hairy overcoad dose hot nides. Haff er drink."
The Missing Link, standing grimly outlined in the darkness, raised the bottle in his two prehensile paws, and drank health to Schmitz.
"Goot man," said Schmitz, embracing him again. "Now con mit me to my 'ous' to, und we make the night." He grappled with Nickie, and the two seesawed towards Schmitz's hotel. The place was in complete darkness; the bar door was wide open.
Schmitz dragged Nickie through the bar, with much bumping and more breaking of glass, into a back compartment, and there he fumbled for matches, forgot his mission, and sang a German song very drearily, stopping suddenly to say:
"Vere haf you gone mit yourseluf, mein goot friend? Vot is der madder mit der lightness."
He fumbled again. Nickie was in no hurry, he had the gin bottle.
Schmitz found the matches, and lit a candle on the shelf. He turned drunkenly towards Nickie, and beheld what must have been a strange and mysterious sight to a commonplace Dutchman in his own home. Sitting on a chair facing him, with the gin bottle raised to his lips, was a mighty monkey—a great, red, hairy ape, as large as a man.
The publican scratched his head wonderingly.
"Mein gracious!" he said.
"Dot iss a sdrange ting dot haff happened mit you, Sharlie," he said, in a wondering, small voice.
"Sharlie!" he called. "Sharlie!" The Missing Link gave no reply.
"Pless mein soul!" gasped the Dutchman.
Suddenly a gleam of intelligence shot through the publican's boosy gloom. He pointed a finger straight at Nickie, lurched towards him, crossed the room in a stagger, and drove his inquiring digit against the mysterious visitor. The mysterious visitor was solid.
Schmitz was beaten.
"Sharlie," he said, "is it true dot you vos, or is it true dot you aind't?"
Nickie offered him the bottle in a friendly way, and Schmitz took it and drank. The draught seemed to abolish all problems.
"Now ye make dot night, Sharlie," said Schmitz. He staggered into the bar, and returned with an armful of bottles—all full of liquor. With the adroitness of an expert he knocked the head off a bottle of schnapps. "Dot is for you, Sharlie," he explained. The Missing Link assumed possession.
Schmitz knocked the head off another.
"Dot one for me iss," he said.
Then the night began. The Dutchman drank and sang and danced, and a hundred times assured the Missing Link of his undying friendship. True, he had occasional spasms of reawakened amazement, when he would gaze at the man-monkey in stupid wonder, saying: "I don't understand me, Sharlie," but Nickie's extremely human manner of disposing of gin seemed to reassure him, and he would burst into song again.
In due course Nickie grew jovial, and lost all sense of his make-up and his professional reputation, and he sang, too, and caper exuberantly about Schmitz's kitchen, while Schmitz, reclining in a corner on the floor, shook his fat sides with gargantuan roars of laughter. The sight of this gigantic ape dancing a Highland Fling stirred the drunken Dutchman to wildest merriment; he howled with delight.
"Goot, goot! Some more Sharlie!" he yelled. "Dance, dance. Mein Gott, dot's der greadest sight I effer haff see me."
This was the strange and awful spectacle Mrs. Schmitz tumbled upon, returning from a week's stay at Rattletrap. Her screams brought the red-headed stable boy to the rescue.
Two minutes later, while Mrs. Schmitz was assuring one section of Rabbit township that her poor, miserable husband had sold his soul to hell, and was at that moment dancing fiendish dances with the devil himself in her kitchen, a red-headed youth, almost beside himself with horror, was stirring up the other section with the tale of Dutchy Schmitz howling mad in the hotel, while a great, hairy, hideous jim-jam capered on the floor before him.
Rabbit was stirred at last. Professor Thunder was made unpleasantly aware of the fact when he discovered a crowd of patriots surrounding Schmitz's, preparing to burn out the devils that possessed it, having peeped timidly at the windows; and assured themselves of the unearthly nature of Schmitz's guest.
The Missing Link, with Schmitz on his arm, came rolling from the back door, roaring and brandishing a bottle. The crowd broke and fled before them, and a minute later the bosom friends were rocking down the road together, singing insanely.
How to recapture Nickie was the showman's real trouble now. He knew that persuasion would be useless with Nickie in his present state, and resolved to try force. He grappled with Nickie in the street, and Nickie, now feeling like a king in his own right, and valiantly asserting his majesty, resented this impudent interference, and fought with fine, royal spirit. For a moment or two Dutchy failed to realise the situation, and then, roaring like a bull, and swinging a bottle of stone gin, he went at the Professor.
The bottle took Thunder in the back of the head. It ought to have killed him, but it didn't—it merely stretched him on the road unconscious. When he recovered he was on a couch in the hotel, with his head wrapped in a tablecloth, and day was breaking. No body knew what had become of Dutchy and the Missing Link, and the Professor returned to the tent, with a soul seething bitterness. He found Nickie in his cage, sleeping soundly, and alongside him on the straw lay the bulky form of Schmitz, the publican, in whose hand was still clutched a bottle of stone gin. The Missing Link had returned hospitality for hospitality, and side by side like brothers dear the carousers slept.
IT was shortly after noon, and the day was warm and still. No one was stirring in Waddy. Professor Thunder had given up the idea that his eloquence could conquer the general lassitude, and was snoring in the tent of the Egyptian Mystic. Madame Marve was shopping in the township, and Matty Cann, the Living Skeleton, had come down from his throne and was curled up on a horse-rug. Ammonia, the orang-outang, sprawled on the floor of his cage, and the other monkeys were chattering angrily.
Nickie sat with his back to the wall of his compartment, sweltering in the hot garb of the Missing Link, drowsing and day-dreaming of beer. He thought he was sitting in a sylvian glade, with an attendant nymph, where a cascade splashed over crystal rocks, and the cascade was beer—all beer.
"Ello there!" said a thick voice. Someone was shaking the bars of the cage. "Get up and do some thin', blarst yer eyes! What have I paid yeh for?" continued the voice.
Tish had taken sixpence at the door, and admitted a patron without giving due warning to the exhibits. It was a rule that the public was not to be admitted to the Museum of Marvels without proper notice being given to the company. The precaution was necessary to obviate the chance of the Egyptian Mystic being discovered in the act of preparing onions for the stew, or engaged upon some other menial task, to the destruction of her dignity and mystery as a distinguished foreigner with supernatural powers. Or the people might have come upon the Missing Link in heated debate with the Living Skeleton, or in the hearty enjoyment of a long beer, or possibly reading a sentimental novel.
Nickie bared the long tusks of his mask in a malignant grin, but did not stir. He couldn't be expected to waste his arts and graces on a common drunk.
The man rattled the bars of the cage again. "'Ello! 'Ello!" he cried, "shake yourself up! Le's see what yer made of. Get goin'. Give us a specimen of yer arts."
The Missing Link yawned hideously, stretching his long hairy limbs, and blinked his little eyes at the visitor.
"Tha's not so bad," growled the man. "You're a bit of an artist, anyhow, but I reckon you ain't nothin' t' some of the Missin' Links I've come across in my time. I've been in the business myself, so you can't monkey me, my man."
Nickie sat up, growled in his best style, and scratched with the dull laziness of a tired ape.
"'Ere, 'ere," cried the man, "'ere, 'ere, Bravo! Not too rotten That's first rate monkey business, take it from Ivo Hobbs. Let me interdoose myself. Mr. Mahdi. Ivo Hobbs, late o' Kitts and Killjammer's Whole World Show."
Nickie walked along the back wall of his cage two or three times with simian ungainliness, turning with a peculiar spring that Mr. Crips had learned from the Orang.
"Good enough!" said. Ivo Hobbs. "Good enough. There's no ticks on you, you're a stoodent, I can see. How's the game mate?"
It was necessary to convince this beery intruder of his grievous error in taking Professor Thunder' celebrated Missing Link, Mahdi, from the tangled jungles of Darkest Africa, for a cheap fake. Nickie sprang to the perch with great agility, caught it with one hand, slowly drew up a leg, hooked a hind claw to the bar and hung so, blinking unconcernedly.
"What oh!" said the audience, with enthusiasm.
"That's a bit of all right. You're a husker. But there ain't no reason for this reticence with a brother professional. I was the bearded woman with Kitts and Kiljammer's show for over two years, I was Shake, mate." The visitor thrust a hand through the bars.
Nickie dropped from his swing, landing lightly on four paws, ambled daintily across the cage, ran up the bars, and seated himself on a limb propped in a corner.
The audience applauded generously.
"Bli' me," he cried, "you're a fool t' waste them talents on a side show like this. You orter hitch on at one o' the great circuses."
Nickie slid down the rope and resumed his leisurely scratching, prospected his ribs for a few seconds, and then made a sudden dash at Ammona, the orang, grappled with him through the bars, snatched away a little fur, and maintained a fierce scratching and snapping squabble for half a minute or so.
This was one of Nickie's most effective bits of business. Whenever he heard an audience casting doubts on his authenticity as a genuine member of the monkey family, he work up a spluttering dispute with Ammonia and the battle was so realistic that it dispelled all doubts.
"Well I'm jiggered." murmured Mr. Ivo Hobbs. "I could have sworn he was a fake." He pressed more closely to the bars, and peered at Nickie with a critical, if somewhat beery eye, and the Missing Link posed languidly in a monkey attitude. Suddenly Ivo jabbed at him with a stick. The stick was pointed, and it took Nickie in the ear.
"Hell!" cried the Missing Link, bounding across his cage.
Ivo burst into a roar of laughter. "That's all right, old bloke," he said. "You're a bonzer, but we all have our weak moments."
Nickie was furious. This assault, combined with the heat and burden of the day, had dispelled his natural apathy. There was always a loose bar in the front of his cage, placed there for effect, so that the Missing Link might work up an occasional sensation by an apparent attempt to break away. Nickie dashed at this bar. It broke before him, and he came through, falling bodily on Ivo Hobbs, and bearing him to the ground. Ivo uttered a yell of apprehension. His beery doubts seemed to fly before this animal attack, and when he realised that he was being bitten and clawed mercilessly, he howled for help at the top of his voice.
Professor Thunder rushed from his slumber, and discovered his Missing Link and a total stranger rolling and tumbling on the ground. By this time Nickie had inflicted no little grievous bodily harm upon the unhappy Ivo, and he allowed Thunder and the Living Skeleton to drag him off, and thrust him back into the cage.
Ivo arose in great wrath.
"This is unprovoked assault and battery," he cried, shaking his fist at the Missing Link. "I'll have the law on you."
"But, my dear sir," protested the Professor, "you must have provoked the poor animal."
"Animal be blowed. You can't jolly me. Think I don't know a fake when I see one, I'll have him run in in half a tick."
Professor Thunder endeavoured to argue with Ivo, and hinted at compensation, but the injured man fled from the tent in a state of blind anger.
"Let him go." said the Missing Link, vindictively. "He won't come back,He's had all the damages he wants."
But he did come back. Ivo returned in a quarter of an hour and he brought a policeman with him, and on their heels came quite a crowd, Professor Thunder, with business-like precision, charged a shilling a head to all seeking' admission.
"There he is!" cried Hobbs, "There he is!" He pointed to the Missing Link growling viciously and baring alarming fangs at the back of his cage. "I give him in charge for grievous assault and attempted murder."
"Come, what's all this, me friend?" asked Constable Dunne, addressing theProfessor.
Hobbs had evidently had a few more beers to restore his faculties. He was now courageous enough, but vague in his mind and unsteady on his legs.
"The man irritated my Missing Link, and the animal attacked him, as he deserved," said the celebrated showman.
"Animal be blowed!" yelled Hobbs. "He's 'a man, and I give him in charge."
"Nonsense!" laughed the Professor; "The fellow's drunk!"
Constable Dunne peered at the Missing Link through the cage, and that intelligent animal never looked more malignant.
"A man" said the officer, dubiously; "sure, he ain't lookin' it."
"Arrest him!" said Ivo Hobbs.
"Devil a wan o' me," answered Dunne. "You'd better proceed by summons, me man. 'Tain't me juty to arrist monkeys, an 'twould not be becomin' t' the' dignity iv an officer iv th' law, anyway, t' be seen draggin' a baste iv thim proportions through the street."
Mr. Hobbs protested indignantly, and beerily, but the constable explained that according to a strict reading of the Act, dogs were not liable to arrest, "and in the oye iv th' law," he said, "monkeys is dogs." Eventually, Ivo Hobbs went away in Constable Dunne's company to take out a summons. The policeman endeavoured to persuade him to summon Professor Thunder, as the Missing Link's next of kin, but Hobbs stood drunkenly to his belief that the monkey was a man, and so the summons was made out against Mahdi, and was solemnly delivered, citing the Missing Link to appear at the Waddy Police Court on the following morning at 10 o'clock.
"Here's a pickle," growled the proprietor of the world-famous Museum ofMarvels.
The Missing Link scratched his head over the document. "I'm nothing of a lawyer," he said, "but I've had a good deal of experience of police courts, and never knew a monkey to be proceeded against for assault—in fact, nothing lower in the animal kingdom than a Chinaman is amenable to the law."
As a result of a long conference, Professor Thunder went out that evening and cultivated the acquaintance of John Lidlow, J.P. John Lidlow, Esq., J.P., was the local butcher, and Professor Thunder found him a very companionable man with an amiable weakness for raw whiskey. Affectionately they made a night of it, and in the morning they had a mutual pick-me-up. The pick-me-up was concocted of knock-me-down rum and colonial beer, and ran into several editions.
John Lidlow, Esq., J.P., was uncommonly sleepy and preternaturally solemn in court when the case of Hobbs versus Mahdi was called on for hearing. Ivo Hobbs explained his grievance clearly, and when the defendant was called upon, Professor Thunder stepped forward and explained:
"The defendant, Your Worship, is my justly-celebrated man-monkey, Mahdi, the Missing Link."
"Is he a man or a monkey?" asked the court, drowsily, opening one eye.
"He's a bit of both, but mainly monkey, Your Worship."
"It's a lie, he's a man," cried Hobbs.
"Silence in the Court!" said His Worship, with portentous hauteur, "or I'll give you ten days for contempt. The defendant must be brought before us."
"But, Your Worship," exclaimed the Professor, "it would not be safe, I assure you, The animal is wild. He was irritated by this man, it would not be safe to take him from his cage. He might attack the court."
"Eh, what's that?" ejaculated the magistrate. "Attack the court? We don't allow that kind of thing here. I'd give the beggar twelve months."
Constable Dunne whispered to the court, and Professor Thunder enlarged upon the shocking temper of the Missing Link when roused.
"Very well," said the Magistrate, "if he cannot be brought to this court, the court will go to him. Justice must be done. This court stands adjourned to Professor Thunder's Museum of Marvels."
Very gravely John Lidlow, J.P., led the court to Professor Thunder's tents, and sedately he established himself behind a table before the cage of the Missing Link, and again the case was called on.
"The Missing Link pleads guilty, Your Worship," said Constable Dunne.Professor Thunder whispered to him. "Through his next iv kin, YerWorship," continued Dunne.
"With extenuating circumstances. Your Worship," said the Professor. "This man attacked my Missing Link with a stick."
The Missing Link at this moment bounded against the front of the cage with a blood-curdling growl, making seemingly frantic efforts to get at Ivo Hobbs. One of the bars broke before his terrific onslaught, and through the apperture Mahdi snatched and snapped at his adversary of yesterday, growling horribly the while.
With a 'ell of terror Hobbs fled into a cement barrel.
The Missing Link flopped from his cage, and advanced upon the J.P.
The sight so upset the court in the person of John Lidlow that it sat for a moment, staring in blank horror across the table set for its convenience, then slowly tilted over in its chair, and fell heavily on the back of its neck, picked itself up, and made a bolt for the open. At the tent door the court turned for a moment, and cried breathlessly:
"Fined five shillings or two days," and then it dashed out and away.
Professor Thunder paid the fine with the greatest goodwill, considering the advertisement an ample recompense. Besides this presentation at court was a useful testimony in support of the his claims of the Missing Link, and the Waddy Bugle's grave account of the trial under "Police Court News" was added to the archives of the Museum.