A Son of the State

by W. Pett Ridge

A roaring noisy crowded gallery, like the side of a mountain going from the base with strong iron rods protecting up to the topmost point, where patrons had to bend their backs to escape the ceiling. General discardment of coats by men and boys, universal doffing of hats and bonnets, and loosening of blouses by ladies. Bobbie, perched on the rolled-up coats of the two men, saw at a distance of what seemed at first to be several miles below, the tightly-wedged people on the floor of the theatre packed closely to the very footlights, and leaving just sufficient room for a small orchestra. Mrs. Bat Miller, still trembling with annoyance, bought oranges, and selecting one over ripe, stood up and threw it, and more by luck than skill, managed to hit the dark young woman, seated below, well on the side of the face, where it burst shell-like and caused annoyance. Having done this, young Mrs. Miller seemed more content, and twisting up her rope of red hair, settled down to unrestrained enjoyment of the evening.

“I wouldn’t ’ave your dispisition,” said Mr. Bat Miller to her, wistfully, “for a bloomin’ pension.”

Bobbie felt pleased to see the two boys from Drysdale Street far above him; they would require all the austerity that a railway arch could give to prevent them from feeling envious of him. He held up a piece of apple and shouted above the babel of voices, “’Ave ’alf?” and when they screamed back “Yus!” he ate it all calmly; thus goading them to a state of speechless vexation. Everybody called to everybody else; the enormous theatre filled with appeals for recognition. Presently through the uproar could be heard the discordant tuning up of the violins, and, holding the Duchess’s thin arm, he looked down again and saw that the orchestra had come in.

The footlights being turned up, the violins began to play. The Duchess said it was nothing to the Alhambra in the old days, but Bobbie felt this could not be true. When the curtain ascended and the uniformed men posted in various quarters of the large theatre bawled for silence, Bobbie held tightly to the Duchess for fear that he might be tempted to jump over.

It was not easy to discover at first the true intent of the play, because the gallery did not at once become quiet; two fights and a faint were necessary before quietude could be obtained. When the words from the far-off stage came up more distinctly to Bobbie’s quick ears, he realized that a plot was being arranged by two gentlemanly men in evening dress to rob the bank of the sum of fifty thousand pounds, and it seemed that they wished to do this unobtrusively, and indeed desired that any credit for its success should be placed to the account not of themselves, but of the manager of the bank. The manager came on just then to a majestic air from the orchestra; the audience seemed to know him, for they cheered, and he stood in the centre of the stage bowing condescendingly before he commenced to interest himself in the drama. He was rather a noble-looking young man, a little stout perhaps, with a decided way of speaking; you could hear every word he said, and when he had to make any movement the orchestra played briskly, as though to intimate that whatever misfortune might cross his path, he had always the support of four fiddlers, two bass viols, a cornet, a pianist, and a trombone. The two villains intimated their desire to open an account at the bank. The manager asked for references. The two villains, first looking cautiously off at the wings to make sure that no one observed them, suddenly flung themselves on the bank manager. They were engaged in binding him with ropes, when a ragged boy (who the Duchess said was not a boy but a girl) jumped in at the window, and said,—

“What price me!”

Upon which the two villains instantly decamped; the ragged boy summoned the clerks (who, reasonably speaking, should have heard the struggle, but apparently did not), and the manager ordered that the ragged boy should he offered a highly responsible post in the bank, for, said the manager to the gallery, of what use is sterling honesty in this world if it be not liberally rewarded? a sentiment with which the gallery found itself able to express cordial agreement. In the next scene the two gentlemanly villains, undeterred by their rebuff, were seen in a vague light, drilling with caution the cardboard door of an immense safe of the bank. They had but just succeeded when voices were heard. Plaintive music and entrance of heroine. Dressed in white, she had come to bring a posy of flowers to the manager, whom, it appeared, she was to marry on the morrow. This visit seemed unnecessary, and it was certainly indiscreet; after the manager had surprised her and had given to the gallery a few choice opinions on the eternal power of Love, which made Mrs. Bat Miller so agitated that her rope of red hair became untied, the heroine went, after an affectionate farewell, leaving a note on the floor.

“You’ve dropped something, Miss,” shouted Bobbie.

“’Ush,” warned the Duchess. “That’s done a purpose.”

This note the villains found, after a struggle with the girl boy, who, demanding of them, “What price me?” was clubbed on the head, and left insensible. The note only required a slight alteration with the tearing off of one page to be construed into evidence of complicity in the crime; so that when, in the next scene, a cheerful wedding party in secondhand clothes came out of the church door, bells ringing, villagers strewing flowers, and wedding march from the orchestra, two constables suddenly pushed their way through the crowd and placed hands on the shoulders of the astonished bride, causing so much consternation that the bells stopped, the wedding march changed into a hurried frantic movement, what time the bride clutched at her bodice, and assured the gallery (but this they knew full well) that she was innocent. A boy inspector, with a piping voice, stepped forward and proceeded to act in accordance with stage law. Woman, I arrest you. Oh, sir, explain. This letter (said the inspector) in your handwriting was found in the bank after the robbery. Sir, said the tearful bride, ’tis true I wrote that letter, but—. Woman (said the stern boy inspector), prevarication is useless; who were your accomplices? You decline to answer? Good! Officers, do your duty. Scoundrels (shouted the bridegroom bank manager), unhand her, before God she is innocent as the driven snow, I swear it. Ho, ho (remarked the boy inspector, acutely putting two and two together), then this can only mean—here the orchestra became quite hysterical—that you yourself are guilty. Officers, arrest him also! May Heaven, begged the bride emotionally, addressing the gallery, may Heaven in its great mercy, protect the innocent and the pure. It seemed that Heaven proved somewhat tardy in responding to the heroine’s appeal, for from a quarter to eight until a quarter to eleven, she and the hero found themselves in a succession of the direst straits, which, apportioned with justice, would have been more than enough for fifty young couples. It did seem that they could not by any dexterity do the right thing; whereas, the two villains, on the contrary, prospered exceedingly, to the special annoyance of Mr. Bat Miller, who, constituting himself leader of a kind of vigilance committee in the hot perspiring gallery, led off the hisses whenever either or both appeared, and at certain moments—as, for instance, when in the hospital ward they lighted their cigarettes, and discussed cynically the prospect of the injured boy’s speedy departure from life—hurling down at them appropriate and forcible words of reproof, that did credit alike to his invention and to the honesty of his feelings.