“Damned the poor link-boy that called him a duke,”
Frank felt inclined to quarrel with the world in general, and buttoned his coat with savage energy when the poor crossing-sweeper held out her toil-worn hand for a penny. He relented too, and gave her money, and felt ashamed that he should have thought for an instant of visiting his own afflictions on that hard-working creature, the more so as a sailor-looking man in front of him had evidently given a trifle to the poor industrious woman.
Frank thought he recognised those broad shoulders, that large, loose frame and rolling gait; in another moment he was alongside Hairblower, and clasping the delighted seaman’s hand with a warmth and cordiality by no means less vigorously returned.
“The last person as I ever expected to come across hereaway,” said Hairblower, his broad, honest face wrinkling with pleasure. “I little thought when I came cruising about this here place as I should fall in with friends at every corner; and pretty friends they’ve showed theirselves, some on ’em.”
As the seaman spoke these last words in bitter and desponding tones, Frank remarked that he looked pale and haggard; and though his clear eye and good-humoured smile were the same as ever, he had lost the well-to-do air and jovial manner which used to distinguish him at St. Swithin’s. Frank asked if there was anything wrong: “You know I’m an old friend, Hairblower; I can see something has happened—can I assist you? At any rate, tell me what is the matter.”
The tears stood in Hairblower’s eyes, and again he wrung Frank’s hand with a grasp like a vice, and his voice came hoarse and thick as he replied, “God bless you, Mr. Hardingstone, you’re a real gentleman, you are, and though I’m a plain man and poor—poor, I haven’t five shillings left in the world—you think it no shame to be seen walking and talking with the likes of me in the broad daylight, and that’s what I call manly, sir: no more didn’t Master Charlie—poor lad! he’s far enough now; many’s the time he’s said to me, ‘Hairblower,’ says he—but that’s neither here nor there. Well, Mr. Hardingstone, things has gone cross with me now for a goodish bit: the fishin’ ’s not what it used to be, nor the place neither. Bless ye, I’ve seen the day when I could take and put my ten-pound note on the old table at home, ay, and another to the back of that! but times is altered now, betterer for some, worserer for others. I’ve had my share, mayhap, but I’ve been drifting to leeward a long while back, and I’ve had a deal of way to fetch up. Well, sir, I’m pretty stiff and strong yet, and the Lord’s above all, so I thought I might just get things together a bit, and streak up here to London town, and so look out for a berth in some of these here ships a-going foreign. I’ve neither chick nor child to care for me at home, and I reckoned as a voyage wouldn’t hurt me no worse now than five-and-twenty years ago. Well, sir, to make a long story short, I got a bit o’ money together, as much as would buy me an outfit and chest, and such like, for I meant to ship as second mate at the worst, and I always liked to be respectable; and when I’d got that I’d got all, but I didn’t owe no man a farthing, and so would be ready to clear out with a clean breast. Lord, sir, what a place this here town is for sights: go where I would there was something to be seen. To be sure I hadn’t many shillings to throw away, and I just looked straight afore me, and I never so much as winked at the mammon horse, nor the stuffed sea-serpent, nor the biggest man in Europe, nor the fattest woman, nor the world turned upside down, nor none on ’em, till I was brought up all standing by a board, where they offered to show me some True-blue Kaffirs, all alive and as dark as natur’. Well, sir, I knew a very respectable Kaffir family once, on the coast of Africa, where we used to land a boat’s crew, at odd times, for fresh water and such like; and, thinks I, I’ll just go and have a peep at the True-blues, and see if they remind me of my old friends. There they was, Mr. Hardingstone, sure enough. Old True-blue was a stampin’, and yellin’, and hissin’, and makin’ of such a disturbance as he never got leave to do at home, and his wives, five or six on ’em, was yowlin’, and cryin’, and kickin’ up the devil’s delight, as I never see them when they was living decently in the bush. Well, sir, when the True-blues held on for a while to have their beer, the company was invited to go and inspect ’em closer, and pat ’em, and feel ’em, and I made no doubt they was Ingines myself, when I got the wind of ’em; but just as I was castin’ about to see if I could fish up an odd word or two of their language, only to be civil, you know, to strangers, True-blue’s wife—she comes up and lays hold of me by the whiskers, and grins, and smiles, and points, and pulls at ’em like grim Death; and old True-blue himself—he comes up and has a haul, too, and grins, and chatters, and looks desperation fierce, and so they holds me amongst ’em. You see, Mr. Hardingstone, they’re not used to beards, ’cos it’s not their natur’, nor whiskers neither. Well, I looked uncommon foolish, and the company all began to laugh; and I heard a voice behind me say, ‘Why, it’s Hairblower!’ and I turns round, and who should I see but an old friend of mine, by name Blacke, as was a lawyer’s clerk at St. Swithin’s: friend, is he?” and Hairblower ground his teeth, and doubled a most formidable-looking fist, as he added, “if ever I catch him I’ll give him his allowance; friend, indeed! I’ll teach him who his friends are.”
For a while the seaman’s indignation was too strong for him, and he walked on several paces without saying a word, forgetful apparently of his companion and his situation, and all but his anger at the unworthy treatment to which he had been subjected. As he cooled down, however, he resumed: “Well, Mr. Hardingstone, in course we went out together, and we turned into a Tom-and-Jerry shop to have some beer, and spin a bit of a yarn about old times; and I asked him about his missus, and he remembered all the ins-and-outs of the old place, and I liked to talk to him all about it, ’specially as I shouldn’t see it again for a goodish while; and we had some grog and pipes, and was quite comfortable. After a time, a chap came in—a big chap, in a white jacket and ankle-boots—and he took no notice of us, but began braggin’ and chaffin’ about his strength, and his liftin’ weights and playin’ skittles and such like; and Blacke whispers to me, ‘Hairblower,’ says he, ‘you’re a strong chap; put this noisy fellow down a bit, and perhaps he’ll keep quiet.’ Well, he kept eggin’ of me on, and at last I makes a match, stupid like, to lift a heavier weight than the noisy one. So the landlord, he brings in half-a-dozen fifty-sixes, and I beats him all to rubbish. So he was somethin’ mad at that, and offered to play me at skittles for five pounds, or ten pounds, or twenty pounds; and I said it was foolish to risk so much money for amusement, but I’d play him for a sovereign, ’cos, ye see, my blood was up, and I wasn’t a-goin’ to knock under to such a land-lubber as this here. ‘Sovereign!’ says he, ‘I don’t believe as you’ve got a sovereign,’ and he pulls out a handful of notes and silver, and such like; and, says he, ‘Afore I stake,’ says he, ‘let me see my money covered; it’s my belief that this here’s a plant.’ ‘You ought to be ashamed of yourself,’ says Blacke, the first time he spoke to him; ‘my friend’s a gen’l’man, and can show the ready against all you’ve got—coin for coin, and shillin’ for shillin’.’ With that I pulls out my purse and counts my money down on the table—eleven golden sovereigns and a five-pound note. So we gets to skittles quite contented, and I puts my purse back in my jacket pocket, and gives it to Blacke to hold. Well, sir, I polished him off at skittles, too, and he paid his wager up like a man, and treated us all round, and behaved quite sociable-like; so we got drinkin’ again—him and me and Blacke—at the same table. After a time my head began to get bad—I never felt it so afore—and the mixture I was drinkin’ of—gin it was and beer—seemed to taste queerish, somehow, but I thought nothing of it, and drank on, thinking as the stuff would soon settle itself; but it didn’t though; for in a little while the room and the tables and the chairs seemed to be heavin’ and turnin’ and pitchin’, and I felt all manner of ways myself, and broke out into a cold sweat, and says I, ‘I think I’ll go out into the fresh air a bit, for I’m taken bad,’ says I, ‘someway; but don’t ye disturb yourselves, I’ll soon be back again.’ So Blacke he helped me out, and directly I got into the yard where the skittles was, I see the place all green-like, and after that I remember no more till I found myself on the landlord’s bed up-stairs; and by that time it was ten o’clock at night, so I up and asked what was become of my friend; and the landlord he told me both the gentlemen was gone, and that they had said I didn’t ought to be disturbed, and that I was often so; and they was goin’ away without payin’ the score, but the landlord was a deep cove, and he wouldn’t let them off without settling, so they paid it all, and so walked away. Well, I got my jacket and walked away too; and all in a moment I thought I’d heard of such things, and I’d feel in my pocket to see if my purse was safe. There was the purse sure enough, but the money was gone, every groat of it—there wasn’t a rap left to jingle for luck, Mr. Hardingstone. Well, sir, it all came across me at once—I’d been hocussed, no doubt—they drugged my lush, the thieves, and then they robbed me—and my old friend Tom Blacke, as I’ve known from a boy, was at the bottom of it. The landlord, he thought so too; but he was in a terrible takin’ himself for the character of his house, and he gave me half-a-crown, and begged I’d say nothin’ about it; and that half-crown, all but sixpence I gave just now to a poor creatur’ that wanted it more nor me, is the whole of my fortun’, Mr. Hardingstone. But it’s not the money I care for—thank God, I can work and get more—it’s the meanness of a man I once thought well of. That’s where it is, sir, and I can’t bear it. Blacke by name, and black by natur’—he must be a rank bad ’un; and I’m ashamed of him, that I am!”
Hairblower got better after making a clean breast of it. He had no friends in London—none to confide in, none to advise him; and his chance meeting with Frank Hardingstone “did him a sight of good,” as he said himself, and “made a man of him again.” Nor was the rencontre less beneficial to Frank. When a man is suffering from that imaginary malady (none the less painful for being imaginary) which originates in the frown of a pretty girl, there is nothing so likely to do him good as a stirring piece of real business, to which he must devote all his energies of body and mind. Byron recommends a sea-voyage, with its accompanying sea-sickness; the latter he esteems a more perfect cure than “purgatives,” or “the application of hot towels.” Not but that these unromantic remedies may be extremely effective; but, failing such counter-irritants, we question whether a visit to Scotland-yard, and an interview with those courteous and matter-of-fact gentlemen who preside over our well-organised metropolitan police force, be not as good a method of cauterising the wound as any other, more particularly when such a visit is undertaken for the express purpose of seeing a friend through an awkward scrape. Frank soon had Hairblower into a cab, and off on his way to the head-quarters of that detective justice which is anything but blind; where the seaman, having again told his unvarnished tale, and been assured that his grievances should meet with the promptest attention, was dismissed, not a little comforted, though at the same time most completely puzzled. Frank’s assistance to his humble friend, however, did not stop here. He liked Hairblower, partly, it must be confessed, because the seaman was so strong and plucky, and possessed such physical advantages as no man despises, though he who shares them himself often rates them higher than the rest of the world. Frank enjoyed associating with men of all sorts, but more especially he relished the society of such daring spirits as are accustomed to look death in the face day by day, in the earning of their very subsistence, and to trust their own cool heads and strong hands amidst all the turmoil of the deep, “blow high, blow low.” Many a wild night had he been out in the Channel with his sailor friend, when an inch or two more canvas, or a moment’s neglect of the helm, would have made the reckless couple food for those fishes after which they laboured so assiduously; and our two friends, for so we must call them, notwithstanding their difference of station, had learned to depend on each other, and to admire reciprocally the frame that labour could not subdue, the nerves that danger could not daunt. So now the gentleman talked the sailor’s affairs over with him as if he had been a brother. He gave him the best advice in his power; he recommended him to go back to St. Swithin’s to prosecute the fishing trade once more, and with the same delicacy which he would have thought due to one of his own rank, he offered to lend him such a sum of money as would enable him to begin the world again, and expressly stipulated that he should be repaid by instalments varying with the price of mackerel and the success of the fishing.
“If once you get your head above water, I know you can swim like a duck,” said Frank, grasping the honest fellow’s hand, “so say no more about it. We’ll have rare times in the yawl before the summer’s quite done with; and till then, God bless you, old friend, and good luck to you!”
As Hairblower himself expressed it, “you might have knocked him down with a feather.”