EPISODE VI
“ALL’S FAIR—”
The single, succinct phrase, “Doings!” linked to an address and an hour, had been passed round among the former shipmates of that obsolete vessel the “Jane Gladys,” and this slogan, acting much after the manner of a Fiery Cross, had immediately rallied the old confederacy to a ready eagerness to stand shoulder to shoulder again to take toll of the world by the exercise of those devious methods at which they were so expert.
And now here, in the cosy back parlour of the little shop in Fore Street, was assembled that quartet upon whom long companionship in the “Jane Gladys” had conferred a sinister brotherhood in ignoble aims and disreputable ambitions; and though each member had passed into a divergent class of shore-abiding life, it was plain that they were all still closely united by a common passion for petty intrigue.
Informal presidency over the meeting was exercised by Mr. Horace Dobb. At Mr. Dobb’s right hand sat the trim and debonair Mr. Peter Lock. On Mr. Dobb’s left was the corpulent and venerable Mr. Samuel Clark, who, by virtue of his appointment of ferryman across the mouth of Shorehaven Harbour, still preserved some remnant of his former nautical environment. Opposite to Mr. Dobb was Mr. Joseph Tridge, who had fortuitously laid aside his maritime jersey to wear a cotton overall in that hairdressing shop which Fate and force had secured for him.
Despite the stimulating and still undisclosed purpose for which the assemblage had been convened, the opening stages of the reunion were largely made up of spaces of vaunting autobiography, contributed by each of the members in a jostling, ill-disciplined way, sometimes separately, but usually in a pressing, conflicting chorus.
Thus Mr. Clark recounted, with great glee, as an example of his acumen, an anecdote concerning a foreign client who was unfamiliar both with the British system of coinage and the current rate of payment for passage on a ferry-boat. Mr. Tridge, in a similar boastful spirit, rehearsed some of his most successful retorts to customers who complained of dull razors or blunt scissors or intrusive lather-brushes. Mr. Dobb, for his part, supplied glowing accounts of the profits to be derived from the second-hand business by a man who was neither unperceptive nor too scrupulously honest and Mr. Lock, not to be overshadowed, revealed many hitherto unsuspected ways by which a billiard-marker might add substantially to his income.
And so the time wore on very pleasantly, till at last Mr. Dobb, looking pointedly at the clock, cleared his throat, and leaning his folded arms on the table, patently assumed a waiting attitude. Instantly a hush intervened, and something of an electric thrill coursed through this old and tried combination of small adventurers, for the time for consideration of serious business was come.
“Well, ’ere we are,” said Mr. Dobb, gazing round on his fellows, “all well and truly hestablished in the town of Shore’aven, like we’ve always ’oped and planned. Sitting round bragging about our cleverness is all very well, but you know my motter, don’t you?”
“‘Strictly business!’” supplied Mr. Tridge. “And I only wish I ’ad ’alf the friendly pints together it must ’ave saved you!”
“It’s a good motter,” said Mr. Dobb, equably. “It’s saved me a lot of talk, anyway, when you chaps ’ave dropped round on the chance of borrering a bob or two. ‘Strictly business!’—that’s got to be the motter for all of us, from now on. We’ve only to work together, and we can make ourselves ’ated for twenty miles round Shore’aven.”