Chapter Twenty Two.
How I tried to forget my Friend Smith, and failed.
When I rose next morning I was nearly ill with misery and remorse. The thought of Jack had haunted me all night long. I entertained all sorts of forebodings as to what had become of him and what was to be the result of my treachery to him. I pictured him gone forth alone and friendless into the world, hoping to lose himself in London, giving up all hope of a successful career, with his name gone and his prospects blighted, and all my fault. Poor Jack! I might never see him again, never even hear of him again!
As to hearing of him, however, I soon found that in one sense I was likely to hear a good deal of him, now he was gone from Beadle Square. Horncastle and his particular friends appeared that morning at breakfast in a state of the greatest jubilation.
“Well, that’s what I call a jolly good riddance of bad rubbish,” Horncastle was saying as I entered the room. “I thought we’d make the place too hot for him at last!”
“Yes, it was a job, though, to get rid of him.”
“Bless you,” said Horncastle, with the air of a hero, “a man doesn’t like hurting a fellow’s feelings, you know, or we could have told him straight off he was a beast. It was much better to let him see we didn’t fancy him, and let him clear out of his own accord.”
“Yes, much better,” answered a toady friend; “you managed it very well, Horn, so you did.”
“You see, when a fellow’s a sneak and a cad he’s sure to be uncomfortable among a lot of gentlemen,” said Horncastle, by way of enlarging on the interesting topic.
If I had not been so miserable I should have felt amused at this edifying conversation. As it was I was rather tempted to break into it more than once, but I remembered with a pang that, though I had a friend to stand up for yesterday, I had none to-day.
“I suppose now he’s gone,” sneered some one of the same set, “his precious chum will be going too.”
“I don’t know,” said Horncastle, pretending not to be aware that I was in the room. “Batchelor’s got some good points about him, and now the other’s gone he might improve if he stayed with us.”
“Besides, he’s got his lodgings paid for him, so I’ve heard,” said another.
“Yes, there’s something in that. And on the whole he’s a pretty decent—hullo, Batchelor, I never knew you were here. So you’ve lost your chum, eh?”
“You seem to know all about it,” I growled, by no means won over by the vague compliments bestowed on me.
“Oh, yes, I know all about it,” cried Horncastle, mounting his high horse, and offended at my tones. “We were too respectable for him here. But we ain’t going into mourning for him. And if you go too we shan’t blub. Shall we, you fellows?”
“Not exactly,” replied the chorus, with much laughter.
I ate a miserable breakfast, and sallied forth disconsolately to my now solitary walk to the office.
Would Jack Smith turn up at Hawk Street? That was a question which exercised not only me but the other fellows who had witnessed yesterday’s catastrophe.
I hardly knew what to hope for. If he did come, I didn’t know what I should do, or how I should meet him. If he did not come, then I should know I had driven him not only from me but from his very prospects in life.
The general impression at Hawk Street was that he would not come. Doubleday and Harris had a bet of a shilling on the event.
“If he does turn up,” said Crow, “it’ll show he means to brazen it out before us all.”
“Then you may be sure he’ll come,” said Wallop, “It was all very well when we weren’t supposed to know,” said Harris, “but now it’s all out he doesn’t expect us to treat him like an ordinary gentleman.”
“It’s certainly not anything to be proud of,” remarked Hawkesbury, pleasantly; “but—”
At that moment the door opened and Smith entered—solemn as ever, and to all appearances perfectly composed and unconscious of the curiosity his appearance occasioned.
But I who watched him narrowly could detect a quick, doubtful glance round as he entered and took his usual place.
He never looked at me. On the contrary, he appeared to guess where I was, and purposely avoided turning in that direction.
The fellows were evidently perplexed, and not quite pleased.
“You’ve won your bet,” said Harris across the screen to Doubleday.
“Never mind, you’ve got your man,” replied Doubleday.
“He seems awfully pleased with himself,” said Crow.
“I wish my governor was a yellow-jacket, so I do,” growled Wallop, “then I could hold up my head like a gentleman. But he’s only a merchant!”
All this was said in a loud voice, evidently for the benefit of Smith. He, however, heeded it not, but quietly took his pen and blotting-paper from his desk, and turning to Harris said, “I want that ledger to go on with, if you’ll unlock the safe, please.”
Harris stared in astonishment. It had passed his comprehension how the fellow could have the face to show up at the office at all, but for him to have the audacity to address a fellow-clerk, and that fellow-clerk Harris, of all people, seemed fairly to stun that worthy.
It took him fully half a minute to recover his speech. Then he stammered out in white heat, “Eh? Do you know who you’re speaking to—you cad?”
“I’m speaking to you,” said Smith, calmly.
“Then what do you mean by it, you son of a thief?” demanded Harris. “When I want you to speak to me I’ll ask you—there.”
Smith looked up with a slight flush on his face.
“You seem to want to quarrel,” he said. “I don’t intend to quarrel. I’ll wait till you choose to unlock the safe.”
This mild reply seemed to exasperate Harris far more than an angry retort would have done. He was naturally short-tempered, and when conscious that he was being worsted in an argument before his fellow-clerks he was always particularly savage.
He walked up to Smith and demanded furiously, “Didn’t I tell you I’m not going to be spoken to by a low gaol-bird like you? If you don’t hold your tongue I’ll give you such a thrashing as will make you remember it.”
“Come now, you fellows,” said Doubleday, “if you must have a row, keep it to yourselves. The governor will be here in a second. Plenty of time for a shindy in the evening.”
Even this interposition failed to put the irate Harris off his purpose.
Seizing a ruler, he struck Smith a blow on the shoulder with it that resounded all through the office.
“There, you cowardly dog, take that for daring to speak to a gentleman!”
Smith sprang to his feet, his face flushed with sudden pain and anger. At the same moment I, who had been a silent and miserable spectator of the scene hitherto, could bear it no longer, and rushed forward to help my old friend. He had clenched his fist and seemed about to return the blow, when, catching sight of me, his face changed suddenly to one of misery and scorn, as letting fall his arm he dropped again on to his seat heedless of the second blow of his cowardly assailant.
Was ever misfortune like mine? Not only had I done my friend the worst injury one fellow could do to another, but at the very moment when, at least, he was about to show his comrades that all spirit had not been crushed out of him, I had by my hateful presence baulked him of his purpose, and made him appear before every one a coward!
And what a scorn his must be when he would rather submit tamely to a cowardly blow than have me suppose that for a moment anything I could do would be of service to him!
However, Mr Merrett’s arrival put an end to further altercation for the present, and during the next few hours no one would have guessed what fires were smouldering under the peaceful surface of the Hawk Street counting-house.
As the evening approached I became more and more nervous and restless. For, come what would of it, I had determined I would speak to Jack Smith.
He seemed to guess my intention, for he delayed leaving the office unusually long, in the hope that I would leave before him. At last, however, when it seemed probable we should be left alone together in the counting-house, he took his hat and hurriedly left the office. I followed him, but so stealthily and nervously that I might have been a highwayman dogging his victim, rather than a friend trying to overtake a friend.
Despite all my caution, he soon became aware of my intention. At first with a half-glance back he started to walk rapidly away, but then, seeing that I still followed, he stopped short and waited till I came up with him.
Already I was repenting of my determination, and this attitude of his quite disheartened me.
Still I could not draw back now—speak to him I must.
“Oh, Jack,” I cried, as I came up. “It really wasn’t my fault—indeed it wasn’t. I only—”
He put up his hand to stop me and said, his eyes blazing with indignation as he did so, “You’ve been a liar and a coward!”
He may have been right. He was right! But the words were ill-judged and rash. I had followed him ready to do anything to show my contrition, ready to make any atonement in my power for the wrong I had done him. One gentle word from him, one encouraging look, would have made the task easy. But this angry taunt, deserved as it was—nay, just because it was so fully deserved—stirred up in me a sudden sense of disappointment and resentment which choked all other feelings.
This was my reward for the effort I had made! This was the friend I had striven so desperately to recover!
He gave me no time to retort, even if I could have found the words to do so, but turned on his heel and left me, humbled and smarting, to find out that it would have been better far for me had I never tried to make matters right with Jack Smith.
But I was too angry to be dispirited that night. His bitter words rang in my ears at every step I took, and though my conscience cried out they were just, my pride cried out louder they were cruel. I longed to get out of their sound and forget the speaker. Who was he, a convict’s son, to accuse me as he had? Half an hour ago it had been I who had wronged him. Now, to my smarting mind, it seemed as if it was he who was the wronger, and I the wronged.
“Hullo, old fly-by-night,” suddenly exclaimed a voice beside me, as I walked slowly on my way; “what’s the joke? Never saw such a fellow for grinning, upon my honour. Why can’t you look glum for once in a way, eh, my mouldy lobster?”
I looked up and saw Doubleday, Crow, Wallop, and Whipcord, arm-in-arm across the pavement, and Hawkesbury and Harris following on behind.
“Still weeping for his lost Jemima, I mean Bull’s-eye,” said Wallop, “like what’s his name in the Latin grammar.”
It wasn’t often Wallop indulged in classical quotations, but when he did they were always effective, as was the case now.
My recent adventure had left me just in an hysterical mood; and try all I would, I could not resist laughing at the very learned allusion.
“Bull’s-eye be hanged!” I exclaimed, recklessly. “Hear, hear,” was the general chorus. “Come along,” cried Doubleday. “Now you are sober you can come along with us. Hook on to Whip. There’s just room for five on the pavement comfortably. Plenty of room in the road for anybody else. Come on, we’re on the spree, my boy, and no mistake. Hullo, old party,” cried he to a stout old lady who was approaching, and innocently proposing to pass us; “extremely sorry—no thoroughfare this way, is there, Wallop? Must trouble you to go along by the roofs of the houses. Now, now, don’t flourish your umbrella at me, or I shall call the police. My mother says I’m not to be worrited, doesn’t she, Crow?”
“You ought to be ashamed of yourselves, a set of young fellows like you,” said the old lady, with great and very natural indignation, “insulting respectable people. I suppose you call yourselves gentlemen. I’m ashamed of you, that I am!”
“Oh, don’t apologise,” said Whipcord; “it’s of no consequence.”
“There’s one of you,” said the old lady, looking at me, “that looks as if he ought to know better. A nice man you’re making of him among you!”
I blushed, half with shame, half with bashfulness, to be thus singled out, but considering it my duty to be as great a blackguard as my companions, I joined in the chorus of ridicule and insult in a manner which effectually disabused the poor lady of her suspicion that I was any better than the others.
In the end she was forced to go out into the road to let us pass, and we rollicked on rejoicing, as if we had achieved a great victory, and speculating as to who next would be our victim.
I mention this incident to show in what frame of mind the troubles of the day had left me. At any other time the idea of insulting a lady would have horrified me. Now I cared for nothing if only I could forget about Jack Smith.
We spent the remainder of the evening in the same rollicking way, getting up rows here and there with what we were pleased to call the “cads,” and at other times indulging in practical jokes of all kinds, to the annoyance of some passers-by and the injury of others.
More than once we adjourned to drink, and returned thence to our sport more and more unsteady. As the evening grew later we grew more daring and outrageous. Hawkesbury and Harris left the rest of us presently, and, unrestrained even by their more sober demeanour, we chose the most crowded thoroughfares and the most harmless victims for our operations. Once we all of us trooped into a poor old man’s shop who was too infirm to come from behind the counter to prevent our turning his whole stock upside down. Another time we considered it gentlemanly sport to upset an orange barrow, or to capture a mild-looking doctor’s boy and hustle him along in front of us for a quarter of a mile.
In the course of our pilgrimage we came across the street in which Daly and the Field-Marshal lodged, and forthwith invaded their house and dragged them forth with such hideous uproar, that all the neighbours thought the house must be on fire, and one or two actually went for the engines.
About eleven we made a halt at a restaurant for supper, at the end of which, I say it now with bitter shame, I scarcely knew what I was doing.
I remember mildly suggesting that it was time for me to be going home, and being laughed to scorn and told the fun was only just beginning. Then presently, though how long afterwards I can’t say, I remember being out in the road and hearing some one propose to ring all the bells down a certain street, and joining in the assent which greeted the proposition.
Whether I actually took part in the escapade I was too confused to know, but I became conscious of Doubleday’s voice close beside me crying, “Look-out, there’s a bobby. Run!”
Suddenly called back to myself by the exclamation, I ran as fast as my legs could carry me. My conscience had reproached me little enough during the evening’s folly, but now in the presence of danger and the prospect of disgrace, my one idea was what a fool I had been.
Ah! greatest fool of all, that I had never discovered it till now, when disgrace and ruin stared me in the face. It is easy enough to be contrite with the policeman at your heels. But I was yet to discover that real repentance is made of sterner stuff, and needs a hand that is stronger to save and steadier to direct than any which I, poor blunderer that I was, had as yet reached out to.
If I could but escape—this once—how I vowed I would never fall into such folly again!
I ran as if for my life. The streets were empty, and my footsteps echoed all round till it sounded as if a whole regiment of police were pursuing me. My companions had all vanished, some one way, some another. They were used to this sport, but it was new—horribly new to me. I never thought I could run as I ran that night. I cared not where I went, provided only I could elude my pursuers. I dared not look behind me. I fancied I heard shouts and footsteps, and my heart sank as I listened. Still I bounded forward, along one street, across another, dodging this way and that way, diving through courts and down alleys, till at last, breathless and exhausted, I was compelled, if only for one moment, to halt.
I must have run a mile at the very least. I had never run a mile before that I knew of, and can safely say I have never run a mile since. But, remembering that night, I have sometimes thought a fellow can never possibly know how quickly he can get over the distance till some day he has to run it with a policeman behind him.
When I pulled up and looked round me, my pursuers, if ever I had had any, had disappeared. There was the steady tread of a policeman on the opposite side of the road, but he, I knew, was not after me. And there was the distant rumble of a cab, but that was ahead of me and not behind me. I had escaped after all! In my thankfulness I renewed with all fervour and sincerity my resolve to avoid all such foolish escapades for the future, and to devote myself to more profitable and less discreditable occupations.
As it was I dared not yet feel quite sure I was safe. I might have been seen, my name and address might have been discovered, and the policeman might be lying in wait for me yet, somewhere.
I slunk home that night down the darkest streets and along the shadiest sides of them, like a burglar. I trembled whenever I saw a policeman or heard a footfall on the road.
But my fears did not come to pass. I regained the City safely, and was soon on the familiar track leading to Beadle Square.
As I crossed the top of Style Street the place seemed as deserted as the grave. But my heart gave a leap to my mouth as suddenly I heard a voice at my side and a bound, as of some one springing upon me from a place of hiding.
It was only Billy, who had been curled up on a doorstep, but whose cat-like vigilance had discovered me even in this light and at this hour.
“Well, you are a-doin’ it neat, you are,” said he, grinning profusely; “where ’ave you been to, gov’nor?”
“What’s that to do with you?” demanded I, to whom by this time the small ragamuffin’s impudence had ceased to be astonishing.
“On’y ’cos t’other bloke he was ’ere four hour ago, and I ain’t see’d you go by. I say, you’re a-doin’ it, you are.”
“Has my fr–– has Smith been here this evening?” I asked.
“He are so; and I give ’im a shine to-rights, I did. But, bless you, he was glum about the mazard, he was.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Ga on! As if you didn’t know. ‘Wot’s up, governor?’ says I. ‘Things is a-going wrong with me, Billy,’ says he—so he does. ‘T’other bloke been givin’ you any jaw?’ says I, meaning you, says I. ‘Never mind, Billy,’ says he—‘you give me a good shine,’ says he, ‘and I won’t mind the rest.’ And there, I did give he a proper shine. He’s a gentleman, he is!”
Jack Smith had still a friend. I had sacrificed him, but he had yet another, more faithful and honest than ever I had been, ready to champion his cause, and rejoicing to do him service.
I slunk home to Mrs Nash’s that evening more disgusted and discontented with myself than ever. My conscience, no longer to be kept down, was reproaching me right and left. I had been a false friend, a vain, self-righteous puppy, a weak, discreditable roysterer, without the courage to utter one protest on the side of chivalry and right. And at last, at a hint of danger, behold me a pitiful, abject coward, ready to vow anything if only I might escape the threatened catastrophe.
Reader, as I curled myself up in bed that night you may imagine I had little enough cause to be proud of myself!