Chapter Sixteen.
Visitors at Number 13, Shy Street.
The concluding sentences of Horace’s long letter, particularly those which referred to his mother’s poor health and the straitened circumstances of the little household, were sufficiently unwelcome to eclipse in Reginald’s mind the other exciting news the letter had contained. They brought on a fit of the blues which lasted more than one day.
For now that he had neither companion nor occupation (for the business of the Select Agency Corporation had fallen off completely) there was nothing to prevent his indulgence in low spirits.
He began to chafe at his imprisonment, and still more at his helplessness even were he at liberty to do anything. Christmas was still a fortnight off, and till then what could he do on thirteen shillings a week? He might cut down his commissariat certainly, to, say, a shilling a day, and send home the rest. But then, what about coals and postage-stamps and other incidental expenses, which had to be met in Mr Medlock’s absence out of his own pocket? The weather was very cold—he could hardly do without coals, and he was bound in the interests of the Corporation to keep stamps enough in the place to cover the necessary correspondence.
When all was said, two shillings seemed to be the utmost he could save out of his weekly pittance, and this he sent home by the very next post, with a long, would-be cheerful, but really dismal letter, stoutly denying that he was either miserable or disappointed with his new work, and anticipating with pleasure the possibility of being able to run up at Christmas and bring with him the welcome funds which would clear the family of debt and give it a good start for the New Year.
When he had finished his letter home he wrote to Mr Medlock, very respectfully suggesting that as he had been working pretty hard and for the last few days single-handed, Mr Medlock might not object to advance him at any rate part of the salary due in a fortnight, as he was rather in need of money. And he ventured to ask, as Christmas Day fell on a Thursday, and no business was likely to be done between that day and the following Monday, might he take the two or three days’ holiday, undertaking, of course, to be back at his post on the Monday morning? He enclosed a few post-office orders which had come to hand since he last wrote, and hoped he should soon have the pleasure of seeing Mr Medlock—“or anybody,” he added to himself as he closed the letter and looked wearily round the gaunt, empty room.
Now, if Reginald had been a believer in fairies he would hardly have started as much as he did when, almost as the words escaped his lips, the door opened, and a female marched into the room.
A little prim female it was, with stiff curls down on her forehead and a very sharp nose and very thin lips and fidgety fingers that seemed not to know whether to cling to one another for support or fly at the countenance of somebody else.
This formidable visitor spared Reginald the trouble of inquiring to what fortunate circumstance he was indebted for the honour of so unlooked-for a visit.
“Now, sir!” said she, panting a little, after her ascent of the stairs, but very emphatic, all the same.
The observation was not one which left much scope for argument, and Reginald did not exactly know what to reply. At last, however, he summoned up resolution enough to say politely,—
“Now, madam, can I be of any service?”
Inoffensive as the observation was, it had the effect of greatly irritating the lady.
“None of your sauce, young gentleman,” said she, putting down her bag and umbrella, and folding her arms defiantly. “I’ve not come here to take any of your impertinence.”
Reginald’s impertinence! He had never been rude to a lady in all his life except once, and the penance he had paid for that sin had been bitter enough, as the reader can testify.
“You needn’t pretend not to know what I’ve come here for,” continued the lady, taking a hasty glance round the room, as if mentally calculating from what door or window her victim would be most likely to attempt to escape.
“Perhaps she’s Love’s mother!” gasped Reginald, to himself.—“Oh, but what a Venus!”
This classical reflection he prudently kept to himself, and waited for his visitor to explain her errand further.
“You know who I am,” she said, walking up to him.
“No, indeed,” said Reginald, hardly liking to retreat, but not quite comfortable to be standing still. “Unless—unless your name is Love.”
“Love!” screamed the outraged “Venus.”
“I’ll Love you, young gentleman, before I’ve done with you. Love, indeed, you impudent sauce-box, you!”
“I beg your pardon,” began Reginald.
“Love, indeed! I’d like to scratch you, so I would!” cried the lady, with a gesture so ominously like suiting the action to the word, that Reginald fairly deserted his post and retreated two full paces.
This was getting critical. Either the lady was mad, or she had mistaken Reginald for some one else. In either case he felt utterly powerless to deal with the difficulty. So like a prudent man he decided to hold his tongue and let the lady explain herself.
“Love, indeed!” said she, for the third time. “You saucy jackanapes, you. No, sir, my name’s Wrigley!”
She evidently supposed this announcement would fall like a thunderbolt on the head of her victim, and it disconcerted her not a little when he merely raised his eyebrows and inclined his head politely.
“Now do you know what I’m come about?” said she.
“No,” replied he.
“Yes you do. You needn’t think to deceive me, sir. It won’t do, I can tell you.”
“I really don’t know,” said poor Reginald. “Who are you?”
“I’m the lady who ordered the globe and blackboard, and sent two pounds along with the order to you, Mr Cruden Reginald. There! Now perhaps you know what I’ve come for!”
If she had expected Reginald to fly out of the window, or seek refuge up the chimney, at this announcement, the composure with which he received the overpowering disclosure must have considerably astonished her.
“Eh?” she said. “Eh? Do you know me now?”
“I have no doubt you are right,” said he. “We had more than a hundred orders for the globes and boards, and expect they will be delivered this week or next.”
“Oh! then you have been imposing on more than me?” said the lady, who till this moment had imagined she had been the only correspondent of the Corporation on the subject.
“We’ve been imposing on no one,” said Reginald warmly. “You have no right to say that, Mrs Wrigley.”
His honest indignation startled the good lady.
“Then why don’t you send the things?” she demanded, in a milder tone.
“There are a great many orders to attend to, and they have to be taken in order as we receive them. Probably yours came a good deal later than others.”
“No, it didn’t. I wrote by return of post, and put an extra stamp on too. You must have got mine one of the very first.”
“In that case you will be one of the first to receive your globe and board.”
“I know that, young man,” said she. “I’m going to take them with me now!”
“I’m afraid you can’t do that,” said Reginald. “They are being sent off from London.”
The lady, who had somewhat moderated her wrath in the presence of the secretary’s unruffled politeness, fired up as fiercely as ever at this.
“There! I knew it was a swindle! From London, indeed! Might as well say New York at once! I’m not going to believe your lies, you young robber! Don’t expect it!”
It was a considerable tax on Reginald’s temper to be addressed in language like this, even by a lady, and he could not help retorting rather hotly, “I’m glad you are only a woman, Mrs Wrigley, for I wouldn’t stand being called a thief by a man, I assure you!”
“Oh, don’t let that make any difference!” said she, fairly in a rage, and advancing up to him. “Knock me down and welcome! You may just as well murder a woman as rob her!”
“I can only tell you again your order is being executed in London.”
“And I can tell you I don’t believe a word you say, and I’ll just have my two pounds back, and have done with you! Come, you can’t say you never got that!”
“If you sent it, I certainly did,” said Reginald.
“Then perhaps you’ll hand it up this moment?”
“I would gladly do so if I had it, but—”
“I suppose it’s gone to London too?” said she, with supernatural calmness.
“It has been paid in with all the money to the bank,” said Reginald. “But if you wish it I will write to the managing director and ask him to return it by next post.”
“Will you?” said she, in tones that might have frozen any one less heated than Reginald. “And you suppose I’ve come all the way from Dorsetshire to get that for an answer, do you? You’re mistaken, sir! I don’t leave this place till I get my money or my things! So now!”
“Then,” said Reginald, feeling the case desperate, and pushing a chair in her direction, “perhaps you’d better sit down.”
She glared round at him indignantly. But perhaps it was the sight of his haggard, troubled face, or the faint suspicion that he, after all, might be more honest than his employers, or the reflection that she could get her rights better out of the place than in it. Whatever the reason was, she changed her mind.
“You shall hear of me again, sir!” said she; “mind that! Love, indeed!” whereupon she bounced out of the office and slammed the door behind her.
Reginald sat with his eyes on the door for a full two minutes before he could sufficiently collect his wits to know where he was or what had happened.
Then a sense of indignation overpowered all his other feelings—not against Mrs Wrigley, but against Mr Medlock, for leaving him in a position where he could be, even in the remotest degree, open to so unpleasant a charge as that he had just listened to.
Why could he not be trusted with sufficient money and control over the operations of the Corporation to enable him to meet so unfounded a charge? What would the Bishop of S— or the other directors think if they heard that a lady had come all the way from Dorsetshire to tell them they were a set of swindlers and thieves? If he had had the sending off of the orders to see to, he was confident he could have got every one of them off by this time, even if he had made up every parcel with his own hands.
What, in short, was the use of being called a secretary if he was armed with no greater authority than a common junior clerk?
He opened the letter he had just written to Mr Medlock, and sat down to write another, more aggrieved in its tone and more urgent in its request that Mr Medlock would come down to Liverpool at once to arrange matters on a more satisfactory footing. It was difficult to write a letter which altogether pleased him; but at last he managed to do it, and for fear his warmth should evaporate he went out to post it, locking the office up behind him.
He took a walk before returning—the first he had taken for a week. It was a beautiful crisp December day, when, even through the murky atmosphere of Liverpool, the sun looked down joyously, and the blue sky, flecked with little fleecy clouds, seemed to challenge the smoke and steam of a thousand chimneys to touch its purity. Reginald’s steps turned away from the city, through a quiet suburb towards the country. He would have to walk too far, he knew, to reach real open fields and green lanes, but there was at least a suggestion of the country here which to his weary mind was refreshing.
His walk took him past a large public school, in the playground of which an exciting football match was in active progress. Like an old war horse, Reginald gazed through the palings and snorted as the cry of battle rose in the air.
“Hack it through, sir!” “Well run!” “Collar him there!”
As he heard those old familiar cries it seemed to him as if the old life had come back to him with a sudden rush. He was no longer a poor baited secretary, but a joyous school-boy, head of his form, lord and master of half a dozen fags, and a caution and example to the whole junior school. He had chums by the score; his study was always crowded with fellows wanting him to do this or help them in that. How jolly to be popular! How jolly, when the ball came out of the scrimmage, to hear every one shout, “Let Cruden have it!” How jolly, as he snatched it up and rushed, cleaving his way to the enemy’s goal, to hear that roar behind him, “Run indeed, sir!”
“Back him up!”
“Well played!” Yes, he heard them still, like music; and as he watched the shifting fortunes of this game he felt the blood course through his veins with a strange, familiar ardour.
Ah, here came the ball out of the scrimmage straight towards him! Oh, the thrill of such a moment! Who does not know it? A second more and he would have it—
Alas! poor Reginald awoke as suddenly as he had dreamed. A hideous paling stood between him and the ball. He was not in the game at all. Nothing but a lonely, friendless drudge, whom nobody wanted, nobody cared about.
With a glistening in his eyes which he would have scornfully protested was not a tear, he turned away and walked moodily back to Shy Street, caring little if it were to be the last walk he should ever take.
He was not, however, to be allowed much time for indulging his gloomy reflections on reaching his journey’s end. A person was waiting outside the office, pacing up and down the pavement to keep himself warm. The stranger took a good look at Reginald as he entered and let himself in, and then followed up the stairs and presented himself.
“Is Mr Reginald at home?” inquired he blandly.
Reginald noticed that he was a middle-aged person, dressed in a sort of very shabby clerical costume, awkward in his manner, but not unintelligent in face.
“That is my name,” replied he.
“Thank you. I am glad to see you, Mr Reginald. You were kind enough to send me a communication not long ago about—well, about a suit of clothes.”
His evident hesitation to mention anything that would call attention to his own well-worn garb made Reginald feel quite sorry for him.
“Oh yes,” said he, taking good care not to look at his visitor’s toilet, “we sent a good many of the circulars to clergymen.”
“Very considerate,” said the visitor. “I was away from home and have only just received it.”
And he took the circular out of his pocket, and seating himself on a chair began to peruse it.
Presently he looked up and said,—
“Are there any left?”
“Any of the suits? Oh yes, I expect so. We had a large number.”
“Could I—can you show me one?”
“Unfortunately I haven’t got them here; they are all in London.”
“How unfortunate! I did so want to get one.”
Then he perused the paper again.
“How soon could I have one?” he said.
“Oh very soon now; before Christmas certainly,” replied Reginald.
“You are sure?”
“Oh yes. They will all be delivered before then.”
“And have you had many orders?” said the clergyman.
“A great many,” said Reginald.
“Hundreds, I daresay. There are many to whom it would be a boon at this season to get so cheap an outfit.”
“Two hundred, I should say,” said Reginald. “Would you like to leave an order with me?”
“Two hundred! Dear me! And did they all send the two pounds, as stated here, along with their order?”
“Oh yes. Some sent more,” said Reginald, quite thankful to have some one to talk to, who did not regard him either as a fool or a knave.
“It must have been a very extensive bankrupt stock you acquired,” said the clergyman musingly. “And were all the applicants clergymen like myself?”
“Nearly all.”
“Dear me, how sad to think how many there are to whom such an opportunity is a godsend! We are sadly underpaid, many of us, Mr Reginald, and are apt to envy you gentlemen of business your comfortable means. Now you, I daresay, get as much as three or four of us poor curates get together.”
“I hope not,” said Reginald with a smile.
“Well, if I even had your £200 a year I should be thankful,” said the poor curate.
“But I haven’t that by £50,” said Reginald. “Shall I put you down for a complete suit, as mentioned in the circular?”
“Yes, I’m afraid I cannot well do without it,” said the other.
“And what name and address?” said Reginald.
“Well, perhaps the simplest way would be, as I am going back to London, for you to give me an order for the things to present at your depot there. It will save carriage, you know.”
“Very well,” said Reginald, “I will write one for you. You notice,” added he, “that we ask for £2 with the order.”
“Ah, yes,” said the visitor, with a sigh, “that appears to be a stern necessity. Here it is, Mr Reginald.”
“Thank you,” said Reginald. “I will write you a receipt; and here is a note to Mr John Smith, at Weaver’s Hotel, London, who has charge of the clothing. I have no doubt he will be able to suit you with just what you want.”
“John Smith? I fancy I have heard his name somewhere. Is he one of your principals—a dark tall man?”
“I have never seen him,” said Reginald, “but all our orders go to him for execution.”
“Oh, well, thank you very much. I am sure I am much obliged to you. You seem to be single-handed here. It must be hard work for you.”
“Pretty hard sometimes.”
“I suppose clothing is what you chiefly supply?”
“We have also been sending out a lot of globes and blackboards to schools.”
“Dear me, I should be glad to get a pair of globes for our parish school—very glad. Have you them here?”
“No, they are in London too.”
“And how do you sell them? I fear they are very expensive.”
“They cost £3 the set, but we only ask £2 with the order.”
“That really seems moderate. I shall be strongly tempted to ask our Vicar to let me get a pair when in London. Will Mr Smith be able to show them to me?”
“Yes, he is superintending the sending off of them too.”
“How crowded Weaver’s Hotel must be, with so many bulky articles!” said the curate.
“Oh, you know, I don’t suppose Mr Smith keeps them there; but he lives there while he’s in town, that’s all. Our directors generally put up at Weaver’s Hotel.”
“I should greatly like to see a list of the directors, if I may,” said the clergyman. “There’s nothing gives one so much confidence as to see honoured names on the directorate of a company like yours.”
“I can give you a list if you like,” said Reginald.
“I daresay you know by name the Bishop of S—, our chairman?”
“To be sure, and—dear me, what a very good list of names! Thank you, if I may take one of these, I should like to show it to my friends. Well, then, I will call on Mr Smith in London, and meanwhile I am very much obliged to you, Mr Reginald, for your courtesy. Very glad to have made your acquaintance. Good afternoon.”
And he shook hands cordially with the secretary, and departed, leaving Reginald considerably soothed in spirit, as he reflected that he had really done a stroke of work for the Corporation that day on his own account.
It was well for his peace of mind that he did not know that the clergyman, on turning the corner of Shy Street, rubbed his hands merrily together, and said to himself, in tones of self-satisfaction,—
“Well, if that wasn’t the neatest bit of work I’ve done since I came on the beat. The innocent! He’d sit up, I guess, if he knew the nice pleasant-spoken parson he’s been blabbing to was Sniff of the detective office. My eye—it’s all so easy, there’s not much credit about the business after all. But it’s pounds, shillings and pence to Sniff, and that’s better!”