Digby Heathcote: The Early Days of a Country Gentleman's Son and Heir

by William Henry Giles Kingston

Mr Bowdler was walking about the room, speaking a kindly word whenever he had an opportunity, both to young and old, of those among whom he had come to live, and whom he was anxious to instruct, and endeavouring, as he felt it most important to do, to win the confidence of all, when he saw the two boys return. Their hair was disordered, their shoes were far from clean, and there were thin lines of dust or mud on their jackets. Julian looked flushed, and Digby had a sheepish abashed manner, very different from that which usually distinguished him. He was very certain that they had been about something they should not, but the question as to what they had been doing he did not think fit to ask. It was already getting later than the hour which he liked to be away from home, so, wishing Mr and Mrs Heathcote good-night, in that pleasant cordial manner which had already gained him their good-will, he walked out to get ready his own carriage. The glass door of the house which led into the garden was open, and so was that which led from the garden into the court-yard. Near his own carriage he saw something shining on the ground. He stooped down, and picked up a clasp knife which he himself had given to Digby a few days before. A groom came and brought out his horse and harnessed it to his carriage. When, however, the man led it out to be clear of the other carriages, in crossing a shallow open drain, first one wheel came off, and then, to his surprise, another followed. As the carriage was moving very slowly, and no one was in it, there was little harm done.

Mr Bowdler said nothing. “That was a cruel trick of those thoughtless boys,” he uttered to himself. “They could scarcely have wished to injure me, but I fear they are the guilty ones.”

He and the groom hunted about till they found the linch-pins and the wires which kept them in, and, having examined the other wheels, he got in and drove off.

The groom, of course, wondered how it could have happened, but it did not occur to him to accuse the young gentlemen.

Soon after this, Mrs Fuller’s coach was ordered. The fat coachman put the horses to, and drove slowly up to the front door. She and four daughters, and two young sons, came down the steps, the first got in, and the latter got up outside, while Digby and Julian stood in the hall looking on. Digby nearly bit off the thumb of his glove in his eagerness, and hesitation and regret, as he watched for the catastrophe he expected. Julian, fancying that they were secure from detection, stood more in front, highly amused at the thoughts of seeing the fat coachman tumble off into the dust.

Just as they were starting, a carriage was heard coming rapidly along the road. The fat coachman thought that he ought to move out of the way, so he whipped on his horses and away they trotted. A stone had been cast on to the carriage-way—the old family coach bumped over it—off flew a wheel—over went the carriage, the coachman and the two lads were thrown off with no little violence, right and left, greatly to Julian’s delight, and the ladies screamed.

Fortunately the windows had not been drawn up, and no one was cut, but being stout people and closely packed, they were very much jammed together. The poor coachman was the most hurt, and the young men had their coats spoilt. They were on their legs in a moment, and while one helped up the coachman the other ran to the horses’ heads. The next thing was to get out the ladies, who, trembling and alarmed, reentered the hall. Grooms, and servants, and gentlemen, assembled from all quarters.

“Look at the other wheels,” said a voice.

It was that of Mr Bowdler. His mind had misgiven him that the trick which he had discovered might have been played to other carriages, and he had driven back. He returned to the coach-yard and warned the coachmen of what he suspected. He found them in a state of great commotion, all crying out for the things they had lost, one accusing the other of having appropriated them. Their anger was still further increased when, in accordance with Mr Bowdler’s advice, they discovered the linch-pins had been abstracted from several of the carriages, and that the necks of some of them had narrowly escaped being broken. They were loud in their threats of vengeance on the heads of the unknown ragamuffins who had committed the atrocious act.

“It’s they gipsies,” said one; “they’ve done it to rob the ladies as we drove along.”