XIV
Ateleven o’clock the boy set out for No. 24 Trafalgar Square. During the small hours of that morning his scheme of action had been planned tothe most minute detail, but so weak is the human character even in the highest moments of its resolve, that on the very threshold of this enterprise, which the boy knew to be the foremost of his life, he departed in an almost wanton manner from this programme upon which he had spent all the powers of his mind.
His visit to the hairdresser; the triumphant effrontery with which he had asked for his locks to be shorn; the calm fortitude with which he had submitted to that searching and public operation; the self-contained manner in which he had given the hairdresser street-person a large piece of silver for his great kindness and courtesy, all these achievements had conspired to imbue him with a valour, which at the very outset of his venture was destined to lead him into an unwarrantable, an almost foolhardy course.
At the corner of Milton Street, at its juncture with an extremely busy thoroughfare which he would be compelled to traverse, there was a recognized halting place for those wonderful vehicles called omnibuses. At this corner it was their custom to discharge and to accept passengers.
As he came to the corner an omnibus, painted a bright yellow, chanced to be standing there. At the sight of it, inflamed with a valour that was almost insolent and without pausing to reflect upon what his act involved, he walked, almost with vainglory, straight into the ’bus. Never before had he dared to enter one alone; such a deed was far from being contemplated by that programme to which he was pledged to adhere; but he had cast the die before he had reflected upon his recklessness, and like an authentic hero in an entrancing tale he was being drawn by two stout, but comely horses to No. 24 Trafalgar Square.
When the conductor came round for the fares he said to him in a voice that was a little timid in spite of its boldness, “W-will y-you p-please stop the omnibus at No. 24 Trafalgar Square.”
“Don’t go to Trafalgar Square,” said the conductor curtly. “Charing Cross Station.”
This was dreadfully unexpected.
“W-would y-you m-mind asking the h-horses to stop, if y-you p-p-please,” he stammered.
“Can’t yer jump off?” said the conductor sharply.
“Oh n-n-no,” said the boy.
“S-s-stop where you are then,” said the conductor.
A girl seated opposite began to titter audibly. The other passengers were content with furtive smiles.
After the lapse of a few minutes, which seemed as long as eternity, the driver stopped the horses of his own accord. The boy jumped out of the ’bus. The conviction was upon him already that he would not be at Trafalgar Square by twelve o’clock. He looked wildly about the dense throng in which he found himself. Where was he? He had lost his bearings completely. If he were not at 24 Trafalgar Square by twelve o’clock his hopes would be shattered for ever. The thought of the little room rendered him desperate. Yet what could he do? He looked up at a clock over a jeweller’s shop. It was already twenty-five minutes past eleven. Only thirty-five minutes more and it would be all over. All his assurance was gone; and he did not know where he was. Yet before he started he had planned everything perfectly. He had looked out the way from Milton Street on a map of the great city; he had committed every street and turning of the route to memory.
However, the street in which he stood was not unfamiliar. Yes, he had been in it several times with his father. It was called—it was called the Strand. Yet he did not know what was its proximity to Trafalgar Square. He had now no knowledge of where it lay, now that by entering the omnibus he had wantonly forfeited all the sense of locality he had acquired. Yet he knew that Squareso well. It was there that he had spent so many delectable hours lately in a noble building, gazing at the wonderful pictures of the ancient painters. He looked up at a street corner, and saw the name Craven Street, and then he looked again at the remorseless hands of the clock. How was it possible to get from Craven Street to Trafalgar Square in half-an-hour? What could he do? The road was a maze of obscurity. The programme had passed entirely out of his mind.
All at once, however, he was touched by inspiration. He knew all about cabs! And they were recalled to his mind by the sight of a number of these vehicles standing a few yards away in a row behind some railings. They were in a place where the traffic made a veritable whirlpool; and he remembered that he had noted that place before, and that his father had told him it was the entrance to Charing Cross railway station.
Yes, he knew all about cabs; his father with marvellous foresight had instructed him in that branch of education. And he had said to him, “Whenever you lose your way in the great city, be sure that you ask one of those cab-driver street-persons to take you to your destination.” There and then the boy felt in his pockets, because he knew that this hazardous but necessary undertaking could only be accomplished by the aid of pieces of silver.
Before he had set out on his great adventure, his father had given him ten pieces of silver. These he now produced and counted carefully. Then having assured himself that he was furnished with the necessary means, he set out to reach the row of cabs. With a supreme effort of the will he dismissed from his thoughts all the frightful risks that he incurred, and plunged recklessly into the mighty stream that had to be navigated ere he could reach the row of cabs. But dire necessity armed him with strange valour.
As he emerged from the whirlpool breathless, butstill alive, into the presence of the row of cabs, he accosted with heart violently beating the foremost of the cab-driver street-persons, who stood at the door of his vehicle eating his mid-day meal out of a piece of newspaper.
“I-if y-you p-please, I w-will g-give you these t-ten p-pieces of s-silver—sh-shillings, you know,” he said, sick with anxiety, “if you will take me in your c-cab to No. 24 Trafalgar Square by t-twelve o’clock.”
With eyes of entreaty the boy held out his hand to the cab-driver street-person, and lying on its open palm were the ten pieces of silver.
The cab-driver street-person’s first act was to look very solemnly at the pieces of silver, and then at the boy with equal solemnity. Then with a solemnity which seemed to transcend either of these actions, he transferred each of the pieces of silver without undignified haste, nor yet with churlish reluctance, to his own somewhat grimy palm.
“C-can y-you do it?” said the boy hoarsely, “or are the minutes too few; is the time too little?”
By this, as if attracted by the mien of the cab-driver street-person, several of his companions had come about him.
“Can I do it, Captain?” said the cab-driver street-person slowly and more solemnly than ever as he looked at his companions, and balanced a large piece of cheese very thoughtfully on the end of a clasp-knife. “We’ll make no promises, Captain, but we’ll try.”
“Oh y-yes, p-please,” said the boy, “d-do t-try.”
“The old hoss don’t purtend to be a flyer, you know, Captain,” said the cab-driver street-person, as he wrapped up the remainder of his meal in the newspaper in a fashion so leisurely that the boy could hardly endure it; “at least not these days, although in his prime he ran second in the Cesarewitch, but there’s no saying what he can do when he tries.”
The cab-driver street-person climbed to his perchas the boy was assisted into the interior of the vehicle by two other cab-driver street-persons who ensconced him therein, and closed the door upon him as though he were a pearl of price. They then stood to await the fruit of their labours with an air of expectancy that was quite politely dissembled.
“I suppose, Joe,” said one of the driver’s confrères, with a solemnity that was in nowise inferior to that of the man on the box, “you’ll go by the Suez Canal and Himalayer Mountains route, what?”
“Yuss,” said the driver as the hansom moved off slowly, “if the old hoss will stand to the scenery. If he ain’t taking any it will have to beviâMentone and the Lake o’ Geneva.”
To the boy’s dismay, the hansom seemed hardly to move beyond a crawl. It went along several narrow by-streets off the Strand which he had never seen before. As he sat in the hansom a faint recollection returned to him that Trafalgar Square must be “over there.” But the cab-driver street-person seemed to be taking him in the opposite direction.
They passed a clock. It was a quarter to twelve. Why didn’t the horse go faster? Then he remembered with a pang that the cab-driver street-person had said it was old. How injudicious he had been to choose an old horse! He should have chosen a young horse when speed was of such paramount importance. But what was the difference between a young horse and an old horse? Had his life depended on the answer, he could not have told. What a lot of obscure knowledge there was to acquire in the practical sciences! Every step he took alone among the streets of the great city some new problem confronted him—problems which no mind could foreshadow unless it experienced them first. Less than an hour ago, when he left the little room, after striving all through the long night to foresee every contingency that was likely to arise, after drawing up the “programme” with such minute care, it had not entered his head that hewould have to ride in a cab, and be called upon to discriminate between an old horse and a young one.
The poor old animal seemed scarcely to push one leg before the other. If only he knew the way, and he knew how to get out of the cab, he would be able to run much faster. Yet the cab and himself and the driver must be cruel burdens for the poor old horse. He felt a pitiless street-person to be sitting there, preoccupied with his own affairs, while he inflicted sufferings upon a dumb animal. But he must, he must, he must be at No. 24 Trafalgar Square as the clocks gave the hour of twelve!
What was that! The chimes of a clock. One, two, three, four; four quarters of the hour! His heart sank. It was all over. The first stroke of the hour of twelve was striking. His pilgrimage had been made in vain. He had one more failure to record. He would never, his sinking heart informed him, be able to retain the little room.
Then he found that the hansom had stopped altogether. The solemn face of the cab-driver street-person peered at him through a hole in the roof.
“Here y’are, Captain,” he said, with a pride that was finely restrained, “number twenty-four. The old ’oss ’as done it on ’is ’ead.”
The boy was out of the vehicle at a bound. He cried to the cabman, “Oh, t-thank you, oh, t-thank you!”
The fifth stroke of twelve had struck. No. 24 was displayed on a door six yards away. Beside it was a brass plate inscribed,Messrs. Crumpett and Hawker, Publishers.
In a state of excitement that he found it impossible to allay, the boy entered through the swing doors. Almost immediately he found his progress barred by a counter. Behind it a miscellaneous collection of street-persons, whose sex was unmistakably that of the male, was writing in books, clicking typewriters, ringing telephones, tying up parcels.
The boy, knowing he had come to stand on the threshold of nameless mysteries, awoke to the discovery that he was entirely divested of the powers of speech and motion. Yet as he stood in bewilderment, not knowing what to do now that after such infinite vicissitudes he had come to No. 24 Trafalgar Square at the appointed hour, the occupant of a tall stool behind a glass partition in the left-hand corner of the counting-house left that eminence, and at a leisure that was really remarkable sauntered up to the counter to the applicant.
The individual who had left the high stool was declared, when he came to stand before the boy, to be no unworthy specimen of his time and country. In age he might have been twelve or he might have been forty; yet upon every feature of a small and wizened countenance, which embodied all the most salient characteristics of the fox and the ferret, was stamped a not inconsiderable intellectual quality. On the score of physique this personage was not so well equipped. He was undersized to the point of the stunted; but Nature, with her liberal cunning, had granted him ample compensation for his lack of inches. He had an air. His air had the inimitable aplomb which is the perquisite of the few.
At first the boy could do nothing but stare in dire confusion at this somewhat sinister figure. He was dumb, yet his lips were wide apart, and he was trembling all over. The whole of the ritual that had undergone such a careful preparation, in which every possible contingency that could arise had been foreseen and counteracted, had vanished from his mind as completely as though it had never been in it.
“The tailor’s is next door,” said the wizened boy, after a period of thoughtful contemplation of him who stood at the other side of the counter. As he spoke he appeared to pick his words with the cool delicacy of a connoisseur.
Another period of silence followed this piece ofinformation, which was broken at last by an ineffectual stammer from the applicant.
“I—I—I d-don’t w-want the t-tailor’s, s-sir,” he said.
“Really,” said the other with a courtesy which, although quite amiable, was in nowise expansive, “I thought perhaps you might.”
“Oh n-n-no,” said the boy. “I—I—I——”
“Perhaps you are not aware,” said the other with a bland, impersonal pleasantness, “that this is the counting-house of Crumpett and Hawker?”
The mention of the magic name Crumpett and Hawker had a remarkable effect. Almost as if at the beck of the wand of a sorcerer it restored to the mind of the applicant the programme which he had forgotten so completely. From the inmost recesses of a breast-pocket, whence it had been carefully stowed away, he produced the letter he had received from that eminent firm of publishers. This he handed across the counter to the undersized and wizened boy, and accompanied the act by a low bow that seemed unmistakably to create a favourable impression.
“M-Messrs. C-Crumpett and H-Hawker,” he said, “P-P-P-Publishers, No. 24 Trafalgar Square, have b-bestowed the honour of this c-command upon me. I—I—I p-present m-myself in obedience to it.”
The undersized and wizened boy having successfully dissembled his astonishment at this unconventional mode of address, read the contents of the letter with a lively curiosity, which he dissembled just as successfully.
“William Jordan, Junior?” he asked.
“Y-Yes, sir,” said the boy.
The undersized and wizened boy began to whistle to himself softly.
“Perhaps you’ll come this way,” he said with a reticence of which he had every reason to be proud.
He lifted up a movable piece of the counter, and indicated to the applicant that he might passthrough. This the boy did almost involuntarily. At first, finding himself immersed into so much publicity, with so many pairs of eyes and strange faces all about him, he feared that his self-command would go. Yet all this had been foreseen in that programme that had been devised with such care. “Courage, Achilles!” he muttered, yet so that none could hear him. And although he felt that the back of his head was being penetrated by the ruthless curiosity through which he passed, he followed the undersized and wizened boy across the counting-house, looking neither to the right nor to the left.
His mentor opened a door in a glass partition and bade him go within.
“The Chief will send for you presently,” he said with courteous austerity. “Take a chair.”
Several street-persons, inclining to young manhood, were in the room. One and all were sitting exceedingly upright on leather-covered chairs. Apparently these youthful street-persons were stouter and taller and stronger than himself. They also had that indefinable quality in their faces that suggested that their outlook on men and things was more mature. A complete silence was maintained by all; indeed, their attitude seemed designed to suggest that other than themselves, no other individual was present in the room.
At first the boy stood nervously in the centre of the room with his hat in his hand. The other occupants contemplated him with leisurely and impersonal aloofness. Presently it was borne in upon the boy that it would call for more courage to stand than to sit, so he sat. He took a chair, and poised himself upon its extreme verge, striving vainly to control the beatings of his heart. It seemed as though they must choke him.
In a little while the undersized and wizened boy entered with the dignity of one who is accustomed to accept responsibility in great issues.
“The Chief will see John Wilkins,” he said.
John Wilkins, a muscular specimen of British youth, six feet high, rose and followed the emissary from high places with an air of slightly bored indifference.
The boy pressed both hands over his beating heart.
The emissary from high places entered again. He carried a newspaper that had pictures.
“Care to look atPunch?” he said. He handed the newspaper that had pictures to the boy with an air of carefully defined abstraction which suggested that he viewed this amenity in the light of a duty.
“Oh, t-t-thank you, t-thank you,” said the boy.
“What’s the screw?” said a handsome, fair-haired fellow to the emissary from high places.
“Thesalaryis ten shillings a week.” The emissary laid a delicate emphasis on the second word.
“Oh, is it?” said the fair-haired fellow. “What’s the hours?”
“Eight till seven,” said the wizened boy.
“Half-day Saturday?”
“On Saturday Messrs. Crumpett and Hawker close at six.”
“Oh, do they! What ’oliday?”
“During the first year there is noholiday,” said the wizened boy, speaking very slowly and distinctly, and laying a delicate emphasis on the last word. “After the first year the holiday, as a rule, is permanent.”
The wizened boy retired from the room with a calmness that could be felt.
“Uppish, ain’t he?” said the fair-haired fellow, speaking to nobody in particular.
The boy turned over the pages of the newspaper. This was of a type he had never seen before. The pictures bewildered him. He turned them upside down to see if he could understand them better. He then concluded that his own mental and moral disorganization had become embodied, and the newspaper fluttered from his hands. The beating of his heart was choking him.
The emissary from high places entered again.
“The Chief will see Calverley Brown.”
The fair-haired fellow stood up and followed the emissary with a precise imitation of the gait and manner of his predecessor.
The emissary entered again and picked up the newspaper from the carpet. His chin was poised at a supercilious angle.
“When one has no use forPunch,” he said with a slowness that made each word valuable, “it is considered the thing to place it on the table, or to offer it to one’s friends.”
The boy’s pale cheeks grew vivid, for the almost exaggerated development of his courtesy enabled him to appreciate that this reproof was merited.
“I—I—I b-beg your p-p-pardon, sir,” he stammered painfully; “I—I—I——”
The wizened boy sauntered out without paying the slightest heed to these apologies. However, the next moment he had sauntered in again.
“The Chief will see Cholmondeley Montgomery Mo-ly——”
“Mullynooks,” said a small, black-haired, black-eyed young man, rising, with a yawn.
“Mo-ly-know,” said the emissary, articulating the name with great aplomb in his own manner.
“Neux rhymes with dukes,” said the young man with black eyes with an air of condescension. “And you got both my first names wrong, but it is of no consequence.”
“I agree with you,” said the emissary with a devastating emphasis, “itisof no consequence. And it is not considered the thing to keep fancy names without one is up to them socially.”
Cholmondeley Montgomery Molyneux retired with an air of such supreme indifference, and of such inimitableflair, that those of his predecessors were made to appear as but the poorest of imitations.
There was now only one other person remaining in the room, one whose youthfulness had beenmerged some years in a robust and full-blooded manhood.
“Cocky young swine, ain’t he?” said this paladin to the boy with a great and sudden friendliness. “I should have to put it across him if I had to do with him much.”
“I—I—I b-beg your p-pardon, sir,” stammered the boy. Under his breath he repeated several words of the English tongue which he then heard for the first time.
“Stow the polite, matey,” said the other with an increasing friendliness. “A cove can’t live up to it when he’s off duty.”
“Stow the polite, matey,” the boy muttered under his breath. What a baffling tongue was this with which he had to grapple!
The emissary from high places entered again.
“The Chief will see William Ewart Gladstone Smith,” he said. “And he desires that each applicant will have his references ready.”
The boy was now left alone. He found it impossible to control his excitement. He rose from his chair, now that no one else was present, and walked up and down the carpeted floor like a wild animal in a cage. What was meant by “references?” This was yet another new development; it had not been included in the programme. How much he had yet to learn in the practical sciences before he could hope to move about the great world out of doors in freedom and security! Even a man like William Ewart Gladstone Smith, who looked just an ordinary common street-person, made use of a vocabulary that was quite beyond his experience.
The wizened and undersized boy entered again.
“The Chief will see William Jordan, Junior,” he said.
Not knowing where he was, nor what he was doing, the boy turned to follow the emissary from high places. He was led through another door out into an ill-lit passage.
“Come in here a minute,” said the emissary.
He led the way into a small, dark room. Producing a clothes-brush, he began to wield it upon the applicant scrupulously.
“There’s a hair-brush,” he said, “if you’d like to brush your hair.”
The applicant thanked him inarticulately. As if he were in a dream he began to manipulate the hair-brush. All this was not in the programme.
“The Chief,” said the wizened boy impressively, “is Octavius Crumpett, M.A., D.C.L. (Oxon.). Be careful of your aitches. Articulate your words correctly. If your references are all right you stand an outsider’s chance. The others were a scratch lot.”
Having uttered these cabalistic remarks, the emissary led the way up a steep flight of stairs. The applicant followed dizzily. His eyes were growing dark. He could scarcely see. “Courage, Achilles,” he muttered faintly as he came to the landing at the top.
The emissary gave a smart, resounding knock upon a closed door. He then opened it briskly and noiselessly, and in a similar fashion stepped within. “William Jordan, Junior,” he said in his clear voice, and with his great aplomb of manner. At the same moment he gave the boy a little push into the room and closed the door upon him.
The boy stood upon the threshold. He could see nothing. There was a curious singing in his ears. All about him was quite dark.
“Good-morning,” said a deep, slow, pleasant voice. It boomed like a bell.
The boy did not speak, but bowed very low, yet he was not in the least conscious that he did so. This act, however, restored to him the sense of vision. He could see; although an intolerable noise of singing was still in his ears.
A somewhat ponderous, double-chinned, exceedingly handsome and prosperous gentleman was standing with the back of his ample form to the fire. The skirts of his frock-coat were outspread,and two white and rotund hands held them apart. He was dressed with a care that was almost religious. His hair was groomed immaculately; his short side-whiskers had been treated by the hand of a master. He wore a glass in the right eye. Everything about him, even the pearl which gave distinction and rigidity to his necktie, was a testimonial to his status. And upon the countenance of this gentleman was a simper of such an urbane expansiveness, that its function apparently was to be antiseptic to a dignity which, without this precaution, must have proved too much for human nature’s daily food.
“You wrote a nice letter,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, “a very nice letter. Did you write it without aid?”
“Y-y-yes, s-sir,” said the boy. He felt a thrill of joy to know that the power of speech had returned.
“A most creditable letter,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett with the benign purr of an unusually well-nurtured feline. “A little unconventional, perhaps—but no matter. May I ask where you were educated?”
“I—I—I d-don’t t-think I k-know, sir,” the boy stammered. This question was not in the programme.
“Curious,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, purring more benignly than ever—“Curious not to know where one was educated. Yet, perhaps it is immaterial. One board school must be very like another. What is your age?”
The boy’s heart gave a leap. This question was unmistakably in the programme.
“E-eighteen y-years and f-fifteen days, sir,” he said.
“How odd,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, whose delightful simper expanded to the region of the smile. “What a curious computation. One had no idea that the Board School was so precise in these matters. I must mention this to my friend Arnold. By the way, I showed my friendArnold your nice letter. He did not consider it typical of the Board School. He said the style had a flavour of latinity. Do they provide for instruction in Latin in the Board School curriculum?”
“I—I—I d-don’t t-think I know, sir,” said the boy. The question was not in the programme.
“Then perhaps we might assume that they don’t,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett. “Perhaps the pleasing flavour of latinity in your epistolary style is due to one of those mysterious side currents of descent which continually perplex the best biographers.”
Mr. Octavius Crumpett’s manner of saying this seemed to be designed to suggest that if his natural power of mind had betrayed him into saying anything unusual, he hoped it would be understood that the solecism of which he was guilty was not due to ignorance of the foremost practice, but was rather the fruit of uncontrollable natural forces.
“You do not look very robust,” he said, looking at the frail figure steadily through the glass that rendered his right eye so formidable. “Are you used to hard work?”
“I have determined, sir, to inure my frame to the hardest labour,” said the boy. This question was in the programme.
“The English they impart at the Board School,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, “is sound and wholesome, if a trifle bookish. I think some of our public schools might copy their methods with advantage. I must speak to Arnold. I wish your chest was a bit broader, my boy,” he said kindly, “and that your cheeks were not so pale, and your eyes were not so sunken, because in other respects you do not seem to be unworthy of the traditions of this house. Do you mind showing me your finger-nails?”
This request was not in the programme, but by now the boy had obtained sufficient self-command to enable him to pluck off his gloves nervously.Of late he had been compelled to wear gloves constantly because he could never keep his hands warm.
In the detached but efficient manner of one accustomed to immolate his private feelings upon the altar of duty, Mr. Octavius Crumpett scrutinized each of the cold and fragile hands, through which shone the delicate veins.
“They are nicely kept,” he said; “they are kept very nicely indeed. I may say that the other applicants, notwithstanding the character of their testimonials, had not a scrupulous regard for personal decency. It would give me great pleasure personally to see you in the counting-house of Crumpett and Hawker”—there was an accession of pride to the mellifluous accents of Mr. Octavius Crumpett—“for you strike one as an exceedinglygentleman-likeandwell-conditionedboy, but in a physical sense nature does not seem to have been so much your friend. However, Mr. Jordan, perhaps you will be good enough to touch that bell.”
From his station before the fire Mr. Octavius Crumpett indicated a bell on his table; and although Mr. Jordan had never touched a bell before in his life, he was able to understand what was required of him, for now all his faculties seemed to be strung up to a point of almost perilous receptivity; and, further, he was able to reel across the carpet, and, by a miraculous intervention on the part of providence, was able to make the bell give forth an audible sound.
The visible and actual proof of that which he had accomplished was furnished by the entrance of the undersized and wizened boy.
“Mr. Dodson,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, “I shall be obliged if you will ask Mr. Walkinshaw to have the kindness to come up-stairs.”
Mr. Dodson withdrew with the air of an ambassador.
The boy’s gaze was one of intense entreaty as he looked through the sacred mists which veiled theOlympian form of Mr. Octavius Crumpett. That emblem of a monumental culture still stood with the skirts of his coat outspread before the fire. Its genial warmth seemed still to make him purr and simper in every crease and fold of his chaste portliness. At every breath he drew he seemed to approximate more nearly to an extraordinarily fine and handsome feline, which finds itself in unusually luxurious surroundings.
His meditations, which must have been those of an optimist, were curtailed by the entrance of a thin, formal, intellectual, yet slightly melancholy gentleman, whose refined and sensitive features were yet stamped with the simper of a large content. Perhaps this cachet of those who take a large view of things had not always been upon that refined countenance, but many years’ association with a foremost practitioner of the amenities of life had had an indelible effect. Habit had become nature. Mr. Walter Pater Walkinshaw might once have had his modest doubts as became any other private gentleman; but he was as fundamentally sound as the great house of Crumpett and Hawker itself. Of the simper there could be no doubt; for in mien, in manner, in deportment he was designed to suggest that, like the wizened boy himself, he had been modelled carefully upon a superb original which at this moment was standing with its coat-tails held away from the fire.
“Mr. Walkinshaw,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, “I have interviewed the applicants; and, after giving every consideration to each candidate among those of whom we decided to limit our choice, I have come to the conclusion that Mr. William Jordan, Junior, is most fitted to enter the counting-house of Crumpett and Hawker. Unfortunately he is not very robust. Have you any views, Mr. Walkinshaw?”
Presumably in these high altitudes these very dangerous implements were permitted to the English gentleman. Or, perhaps, it was that with hisfine instinct, Mr. Octavius Crumpett had divined that in any case the views of Mr. Walkinshaw would be orthodox. For after that gentleman had proceeded very earnestly to scrutinize the shrinking countenance of Mr. William Jordan, Junior, his views concurred with those that had been already expressed by the head of the firm.
“No, sir,” said Mr. Walkinshaw; “not very robust.”
“May I ask, Mr. Walkinshaw,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, “are the duties of an arduous nature which are incident to the career of a handy youth? I am afraid I have no first-hand knowledge.”
The simper of Mr. Octavius Crumpett was of a most winning character.
“No, sir, I dare say not,” said Mr. Walkinshaw, taking the extreme course of permitting himself to lapse sufficiently from the deportment of his model as to indulge in a hearty laugh. But the circumstances seemed to demand it. “I think I am correct, sir,” continued Mr. Walkinshaw, “in saying that the duties usually incident to the career of a handy youth are not in any sense of the word light ones. But in the counting-house of Crumpett and Hawker they may admit of mitigation.”
“Could you tell me, Mr. Walkinshaw, what would be asked of one who sustained that character in the counting-house of Crumpett and Hawker?” said the head of that great house with a sweetness that was a happy mingling of the cherub and the seraph.
“His chief duty would consist, sir, in pasting labels on rejected manuscripts,” said Mr. Walkinshaw; “and he would be called upon to fill in his time by addressing envelopes, carrying ledgers, copying letters, keeping the counting-house tidy, and in trying to be of general service.”
“Do you feel that you could sustain these responsibilities?” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett to the applicant.
“I will not fail, sir,” said the boy.
The manner in which he expressed this determination seemed favourably to impress both gentlemen.
“I think, Mr. Walkinshaw,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, in a voice that was charged with emotion, “in the circumstances we shall be almost justified in introducing Mr. William Jordan, Junior, into the counting-house of Crumpett and Hawker.”
“I concur, sir,” said Mr. Walkinshaw, in a voice whose own emotion was attuned with supreme good breeding to that of his chief. “I concur.”
“I hope, Mr. Jordan,” said Mr. Octavius Crumpett, whose beautiful and vibrant tones had acquired a paternal inflection, “that you will contrive to maintain the excellent impression you have already created. For let me assure you, Mr. Jordan, it is easier for the average youth to become an Extension Lecturer than it is for him to occupy a stool in the counting-house of Crumpett and Hawker. Good-morning, Mr. Jordan.”
Mr. Octavius Crumpett concluded by thrusting out his right hand so suddenly and so unexpectedly, that the boy shrank away from him as though he were expecting to receive a blow.
“Shake it,” whispered Mr. Walkinshaw in his ear.
The boy grasped the firm white hand with a timidity that would not have been out of place had it been the fore-paw of a polar bear. However, his trepidation seemed further to prepossess him in the favour of both gentlemen. It was not always that those of his callow years had this nice but lively discrimination of the fine shades of the social cosmogony into which unsmiling Fate had projected them.
Mr. Walter Pater Walkinshaw conducted in person down the steep stairs the latest addition to the clerical staff of Messrs. Crumpett and Hawker. He led him into the counting-house, into the midstof that concourse of fellow-labourers in what was now to be his vineyard through which he had already passed.
As Mr. Walter Pater Walkinshaw did this he said, with an impressiveness of which the occasion seemed to be worthy, “Above all, Mr. Jordan, it behoves you to remember that the humblest occupant of a stool in the counting-house of Messrs. Crumpett and Hawker isab ovoa candidate for election to the Athenæum Club under the rulehonoris causâ.”
Unfortunately, Mr. Jordan’s limited acquaintance with the practical sciences did not permit him to realize the golden vista which thus early in life had come to unfold itself before him.
With this exhortation Mr. Walter Pater Walkinshaw relinquished his charge into the safe keeping of the undersized and wizened boy.
“Mr. Dodson,” said Mr. Walkinshaw, “be good enough to assume responsibility for Mr. William Jordan, Junior. Be good enough to inspire him, as far as in you lies, with the particular tone that tradition exacts from all who are associated, even in the humblest capacity, with this eminent and old-established publishing house. His main duty, Mr. Dodson, will, as you know, consist in tying up, sealing, and labelling rejected MSS. See to it that he observes particular care in using black wax in all cases of rejection. In the less frequent, the much less frequent instances of acceptance, he will, of course, observe the rule of using red sealing wax. That is, of course, for fiction only. For biography and travel he will, of course, use yellow, and I need not remind you that for poetry andbelles lettreshe will invariably use purple.”
“Oh yes, sir,” said the wizened boy, with an air of great intelligence, “Mr. Jordan shall be initiated into everything.”