William Jordan, Junior

by J. C. Snaith

“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 pass through. 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.