# Green Book/'Pals'

The Adventures of Mrs. Middleton's Husband #5. Extracted from Green Book magazine, Dec 1918, pp. 1080–1095. Accompanying illustrations by R. L. Lambdin omitted.
Peter Middleton, you remember, left the wealthy wife whom he adored, resolved not to return till he had won financial equality with her.
“Pals”
By I. A. R. WYLIE
Illustrated by R. L. Lambdin
“AYE, times is wery 'ard,” said Mrs. Bunbury gloomily, “wery 'ard. There's my Garge downstairs a-'owling for 'is beer. And 'ow am I to get 'im beer when I aint got a farthing and everybody b'ind'and with their rent? Talk about the millennium—I don't see no millennium nowhere.”
“Wot's the millenniyum?” inquired Lizz, peering out of the window.
Mrs. Bunbury sniffed.
“Wot's always a-coming and never comes,” she said. “The Parson told me about it. We was all a-going to be 'appy and 'ave more to eat than we can 'old—like them there millionaires. 'Seems to me,' say I to the Parson, 'that there millennium's got sort of stuck round 'Yde Park way, and it'll need a good strong push to get it to come along down our street.' 'Mrs. Bunbury,' says 'e to me, '’eaving is our habiding-place—'”
“You aint seen it about nowhere, 'ave you?” demanded Lizz suddenly. She was now half out of the window, gazing down the narrow dirty street toward the factory at the far end, from whence came a dull, monotonous sound like the roaring of an angry sea. Her faint emphasis on the “it” suggested something more immediate and personal than “'eaving,” and apparently Mrs. Bunbury understood the reference. She shook her untidy head.
“Not since four o'clock. The last I saw of it was a-running down the street full tilt for the row. Lizzy, I'd be a bit nervous, if I was you. A delicate hinfant like that in a nasty crowd! Don't seem to me no'ow that she's long for this earth.”
“Oh, she's all right,” Lizz interrupted with a fierce cheerfulness. “No 'arm 'll come to 'er. Doctor said she wanted a bit o' feeding up—that's orl.” She threw a wistful glance at the hard-faced woman beside her. “'S'pose you 'aven't got 'alf a loaf you could—sort of—lend me, 'ave you?” she burst out.
Mrs. Bunbury stiffened. Figuratively, she bristled impartially like a hedgehog against everybody and everything.
“Not a quarter,” she said. “Times is 'ard, Lizzy. Wot I says to the Parson. I says, 'Mark my words, one of these 'ere days there'll be an hawful hup'eaval, and then we'll see 'o's top-dog—'” She was already halfway to the door and with a final, “Don't you forget that rent, Lizz,” was out of it before any further appeal could be made. Downstairs a hoarse, stentorian voice raised itself in command and imprecation, and then came Mrs. Bunbury's soothing response. “'Horl right, Garge,” she answered. “I'm a-coming,” and the door closed.
LIZZ stared gloomily after her, her pretty, rather haggard face overshadowed with anxiety. The hubbub at the far end of the street had increased to a definite and threatening howl in which catch-phrases of more or less logical import—a persistent request to know whether the howler was downhearted or not being the most popular—became distinctly audible.
Lizz slammed down the window, and with the descent of the smutty panes, patched in one place with a piece of brown paper, the shadows in the little room deepened and shrouded something of its abject barrenness. A table, one chair and a bit of broken mirror hanging by the window—nothing more. Lizz considered each object in turn as though weighing its possible value and then, sighing, crossed the room and opened the wall-cupboard, from which, after careful searchings in its inky depths, she produced a handful of crusts and a bone of mysterious origin. These relics she replaced hastily as the door opened.
The man who entered gave her no greeting. He slouched forward, tossing his cap on the table, and scowled gloomily at the latter's emptiness. He was young, possibly good-looking after the heavy fashion of his class, but at that moment his features were masked with a sullen, disfiguring bitterness.
“Lock-out!” he announced briefly.
“Nah!”
“It's true. They wont come to terms. It's a lock-out, I tell you.”
“There's the union!”
“Broke—cleaned out by the last fight—and they knows it. Them there wot sits in palaces and drives about in forty-'orsepowers can just wait as 'appy as lords until they've starved us into crawlin' back on our knees. I knows 'em.”
“Lor'!” said Lizz blankly.
The man looked about him as though seeking something.
“Anythink to tike round?”
“Nah! I took the bedding to old Ikey this morning, but 'e wouldn't give me nothing for it—said bedding was just a-pouring in. P'r'aps it's as well. The kid's got to sleep somewhere.”
“That's true. Where's it got to?”
“Don't know. Out in the streets somewhere, I s'pose. I was beginning to worrit a bit—”
“Don't you, missus. One of the cops'll find it. It always 'as come back.” He dragged the one chair up to the empty fireplace and sat down with his elbows on his knees, staring morosely in front of him. “Kids is dratted nuisances,” he added with a deep growl. “Wot's the good of 'em?”
“Wot's the good of anythink?”
“Aw don't know.”
THEY relapsed into silence. Lizz came and stood opposite him, arms akimbo, staring with the same blank solemnity into the cheerless grate. Presently he spoke again.
“Seems to me it would be a good thing if it didn't come back.”
“Bill!”
“Aw means it.” He rubbed his grimy palms fiercely against his knees. “Lawst kids gets took to horphenages and hinstitoots where they gets fed and clothed and heddicated. They 'as a chawnce. Wot chawnce 'as our kid? We aint got nothink to give it when it does come 'ome.”
She nodded. “And that 'ungry as it always is! Doctor said if it didn't get fed up, it might—it might—” She broke off.
“Lizz, wot's we a-going to do?” He looked up at her, and the grow! became a hoarse groan of helpless appeal. She laid a clumsy comforting hand on his shoulder.
“I'll get a bit of charing on Monday, Bill. That'll keep us going for a bit.”
“You're a good sort, Lizz.” He patted the hand with a rough. tenderness. “Best pal I've ever 'ad. But I reckon it wont feed the kid when it comes 'ome. That 'ungry too! And then it'll 'owl! Lizz, s'help me, Gawd, I can't stand that—I can't stand it 'owling.”
“P'r'aps the millenniyum's a-coming wot Mrs. Bunbury was a-telling me about,” she said dreamily.
“Aint no such thing as millenniums for the likes of us, old girl. I aint no hanarchist, Lizz, but when the kid 'owls 'cause it's 'ungry, then there's folk I'd like to see blowed up sky-'igh—them there millionaires in their forty-'orsepowers and them painted women wot never so much as scrub a floor. When I think of them, I—” He broke off with a growl that sounded like a reiterated “S'help me, Gawd,” and relapsed once more into sullen brooding.
THE darkness deepened. The shouts had long since subsided, leaving the usual evening chatter of women's voices and the squall of children in full possession. Husband and wife listened intently.
“It would be a good thing if it didn't come back,” he repeated after a long interval.
“Aw.”
Silence again. Bill felt for his tobacco pouch and finding it empty cursed fluently.
“I'm thinking it's a-getting a bit late,” he muttered. “I reckon I'll just 'ave a look up the street and see—” He slouched sheepishly toward the door which at that moment resounded under a sharp rap. From the other side an unknown, masculine voice inquired if one Bill Higgins was to be found here, and on an affirmative “Aw,” the door opened.
“Then I fancy I have got something here which belongs to you,” the voice said pleasantly.
Lizz fumbled for the matches and lighted a stump of candle with which she cautiously approached, her husband at her heels. By the frail light the stranger loomed up like a big shadow, and in his arms he held something round and small that began with a mop of fair hair and ended off with a pair of naked, mud-bespattered and minute legs.
“Thank Gawd!” It came under their breath from both of them. Bill made a gesture graphically imposing silence.
“For 'eaving's sake don't say nothink, or it'll wake and 'owl for its supper. If you'd just step this way, sir—”
He was not quite clear why he had said “sir,” but his brief glimpse of the stranger's face and the stranger's clothes which sat on the well-set-up figure in a way vaguely reminiscent of “swells” had brought out the title without any will of his own. The stranger followed on tiptoe into the adjoining room, which contained one big bed and one small one,—apparently an enlarged and glorified soap-box,—a table, a tin basin, a chipped ewer and nothing else. Very gently that stranger lowered his burden into the soap-box. Whereupon the burden wriggled, extended two small and dirty hands, gripped the lapel of his coat and gave a drowsy sigh.
“I want my p'liceman.”
Lizz suppressed a giggle.
“It thinks you're a copper, sir,” she explained in hushed accents. “There aint one of them round these parts wot 'asn't 'ad to bring 'er back some time or other, and she's got sort of accustomed to the idea. We're—we're much obliged, sir.”
“Aw!” in earnest accents from the shadows.
The stranger smiled.
“It's nothing,” he said. “I found her crying in a rather nasty crowd. She told me where she lived, and we got on splendidly. By the way, there seems to be a row of some sort going on.”
“Strike at Blankley's,” was the laconic answer. “Second this year. It's broke most of us.”
“I am sorry. And I'm rather sorry for myself. I was looking out for a job. I—I'm a mechanician; at least, I know something about motorcars, and I've got a patent brake that I thought Blankley's might be glad to have a look at. I say, it's a confounded nuisance.” He was silent a moment. “I—I suppose you don't know of a room in these parts that I could have? I'm rather hard up, but I could give ten shillings a week for anything clean.”
THERE was a suppressed gasp. Ten shillings! Fabulous, mad, unheard of! In that half-empty garret it represented the nearest imaginable approach to wealth. Said Bill:
“Aint nothink like that in these parts, sir.”
“Leastways—” Lizz faltered under her husband's amazed glance. “Leastways—we—we've got a room, sir. It's our sitting-room just now, sir-but you could 'ave it. I could make up a bed, sir. It aint much, but it's clean—and—” She broke off, fumbling in nervous trepidation with her apron, her eyes fixed hungrily, appealingly on the stranger's face. He looked about him, but it was that appeal which he saw first and last.
“I couldn't turn you out like that,” he said. “It wouldn't be fair to put you to so much trouble—”
“It wouldn't be a trouble, sir. It would be a gawdsend—”
“I want my p'liceman!” came in a sudden wail from the soap-box.
The stranger laughed quietly. He seemed to have made his decision.
“I think that settles it,” he said. “If you really will have me, I'll stop. I'll pay in advance, though. Here's for the first week, Mrs. Higgins,—-and—and I'll just get my bag. It's downstairs.” From the door he glanced back for an instant. “My name is Middleton—-Peter Middleton,” he said, and was gone.
Between husband and wife there was a moment's tense silence. Lizz held herself defiantly. Bill had his hands thrust deep in his pockets.
“You've gone stark, staring mad,” he burst out. “Giving away our bed like that! Wot's to become of me, I should like to know—”
To his amazement she brushed him suddenly and impatiently on one side.
“You go along, Bill 'Iggins! You'll sleep like a top wherever I put you—and I aint a-going to 'ave the kid starved for no one. So there! And don't you try to interfere with me. I'm a-running this 'ere show now, and don't you forget it.”
“Lizz!” he gasped—and then in accents of meek question: “Where's you a-going, old girl?”
“To get it its milk.” She glanced back over her shoulder and softened. “And p'r'aps a pint o' beer,” she added gently.
“SO you aint a real policeman, after all?”
“No, I'm afraid I'm not—nothing so interesting. I apologize.”
It, otherwise the kid, otherwise—according to the Parish Register—Emily Victoria-Regina Higgins, sat up solemnly on the edge of the table where she had perched herself and surveyed the bogus emissary of the Law with thoughtful eyes. She was not, judging by refined standards, a pretty child. Her one claim to that distinction—a bunch of golden curls—often led strangers, approaching her from behind, to expect angelic wonders from the front view, in which expectations they were always grievously disappointed. For Miss Emily Higgins had an impertinent nose, an impertinent mouth, a pair of bold, impertinent eyes in a thin, very human and rather pathetic little face. She was, in fact, a characteristic product of the slums in which she lived and had her being. At the present moment, however, her frame of mind was decidedly subdued, and Peter Middleton, glancing up from his drawings, observed that the impertinence was veiled over by an unusual gravity.
“What made you think I was a policeman?” he asked, anxious to prevent the silence from becoming awkward.
“'Cause you brought me home.”
“Are you very disappointed?”
“Naw, you're better than a policeman. You're a nob.”
“And pray—what is a nob?”
“Lor! Don't you know that? A nob's a gent.”
“And what,” inquired Peter gravely, “is a gent?”
“A fellow wot 'as nough to eat,” was the prompt answer.
The young man leaned back in his chair and considered his visitor with a new interest. On close inspection Emily Victoria-Regina did not look quite so babyish as her eight years suggested. He noticed that the cheeks were a little pinched and that there was a trace of precocious bitterness about the mouth which vaguely hurt him.
“Don't you always have enough to eat?” he asked.
“Lor', no!” She seemed to brush the question aside. “Wot's you a-doing with all them funny papers?” she asked abruptly.
HE understood her. Even in Paradise Row there is etiquette. There are questions that are not asked—reserves upon which the stranger must not trespass. And he had trespassed. Yet he persisted cunningly, changing his manner from that of sympathy to a bluff good comradeship.
“Look here, you like me, don't you?”
“Yus.”
“Well, I like you. So we're pals.”
“Are we?” Her eyes brightened.
“Rather—honor bright. Shake!”
She gave him her hot, sticky little paw, and they shook solemnly. Peter leaned back with an air of satisfaction.
“That's good. Now, see here, Victoria-Regina, it's a law among pals that they tell each other everything. Supposing one pal is in difficulties or has a pain,—or anything of that sort,—he's bound to tell the other pal. Understand?”
“Yus.”
“And pals must help each other.”
“Yus.” She was silent a moment. “I'm 'ungry,” she announced bluntly. “I'm always 'ungry.”
Peter looked at her aghast. There was nothing dramatic about her statement. It was evidently made conscientiously in keeping with their agreement and had no ulterior motive. Peter put his hand to his pocket and drew it away wincing.
“I'm afraid I'm a rotten sort of pal, after all,” he said bitterly. “But look here—do you see these papers?”
“Yus.”
“Well, perhaps one day they'll make me rich,—very rich—and then you sha'n't be hungry any more, Victoria-Regina.”
“G'arn! You're kidding!”
“I'm not—honor bright. It's my invention. People pay a lot for anything that will make things a little easier, a little more comfortable for themselves. That's what my invention will do.”
“It aint a-going to make nothing easier down our way, I reckon,” she said sagely. “It's for them millionaires, aint it?”
“Yes, I suppose so.”
“And then you'll be a millionaire too?”
“No, not that exactly, I'm afraid.” He caught the glint in her eyes. “Wouldn't you like me any more if I were?” he asked gravely.
“Naw!”—with great decision. “Millionaires is wicked.” Her tone permitted of no contradiction. Her small elfish face was clasped between two grubby paws, and she glowered at him fiercely. “They tikes away poor folks' earnings,” she added. “They's the para-parakites wot sucks the blood out of us.”
The familiar claptrap sounded strangely incongruous on the childish lips. Peter Middleton bent over his work to hide his confusion.
“I think you'd find millionaires were pretty much like the rest of us,” he ventured meekly, “sometimes happy, more often pretty miserable. Food and soft raiment aren't everything, Victoria-Regina.”
“G'arn!” said Victoria-Regina rudely and incredulously.
FOR a time he worked in silence, the while she watched him with profound curiosity. Her next question successfully aroused him.
“Got a girl, pal?”
“A girl? You mean—? Why, yes.”
She sidled closer to him.
“Wot's she like? Pretty?”
“Awfully pretty.”
Middleton's pen dropped from his hand. He stared absently out of the newly paned window, over the dirty chimney-pots into a world which Victoria-Regina dimly suspected, vaguely resented. “Why don't she come to you?” she persisted.
Middleton started and smiled up at her.
“My girl is a fine lady, Victoria-Regina,” he said gently, “a very fine lady. That's why I'm working so hard—so that one day, perhaps, she will come, or that I shall be able to go back to her.”
“If I was 'er, I'd come now,” she affirmed vigorously.
Peter Middleton rose with a sigh and gathering up his papers arranged them in a neat pile.
“Then I should have to send you back again,” he said. “Fine ladies have to be won, you know—otherwise there's the mischief to pay.”
“Lor'!” said Victoria-Regina, deeply mystified. “'Ave you got to get to be one of them there millionaires fust then?”
“Something like it.” He pinched her cheek—the only caress permitted. “Only we shall still be pals, and I promise that I sha'n't be wicked. I'll set you all up—first class—and see that you have a jolly little house somewhere out of all this misery and enough to eat—”
“More than enough!” she improved firmly.
“More than enough, of course, you poor little mite!”
For once she allowed the term of affection to pass without reproof. Probably she had not heard it, for she did not even notice that he had taken his hat and coat and had gone out. She sat there with her brooding eyes fixed on the little bundle of transfer paper—very much as Cinderella must have gazed at the magic pumpkin—and did not move until her mother made an irate appearance at the door.
“Now then, you come along out of that, Vicky! Wot are you a-doing there, I should like to know?”
The child slid down slowly from her perch.
“Orl right, Mother, I'm a-coming. I was only thinking.”
“Thinking, indeed!” Mrs. Higgins slammed down a tin plate on the table with a fierce energy. “Don't know wot's a-coming to you, Vick. Wot was you a-thinking about?”
“About them there millionaires. Seems to me millionaires can't be all wicked, Mother.”
“'O said they was?”
“Father.”
“Don't you tike no notice of wot 'e says,” Lizz recommended. “'E's a man. Ere, you tike this and give it to Mrs. Bunbury with my compliments. It's for last week's rent. And mind you get a receipt. And bring up a pint of beer for your father. The strike'll be over to-day, and he'll want to celebrate a bit, poor chap.”
“Orl right.” She trotted obediently toward the door, the half-sovereign in one grimy fist, the beer-jug in the other. “E's a-coming upstairs now,” she added suddenly.
“Then wait a bit—”
THE heavy, laboring steps sounded on the landing. The door was pushed roughly open, and Bill Higgins slouched into the room. For a moment no one spoke. Even Victoria-Regina, the dauntless, shrank back involuntarily. Her mother, arms akimbo, stood staring at her husband with frightened eyes.
“Lor', Bill, wot's come over you, man? Wot's the matter? You look that queer—”
“Strike's over.”
“Well, that aint nothing to go green about. It's a good job. I never did know wot you was a-squabbling for—”
“My job's gone.”
“Bill!”
“They've guv it to another cove—a new un—wot's been an' offered 'isself cheap. They've done with me—”
“Bill!” Her arms dropped to her sides as though struck with a sudden weakness. “Bill, they daren't. T'other chaps wont stand it. They'll come out again—”
“No, they wont.” He laughed thickly, savagely. “They're done up—cleaned out—'alf starving, most of them. They wont fight for no one—I wouldn't either. We're beat!” Bill ground out his words from between set teeth. “But if I find 'im wot's took my job, I'll finish 'im—I'll do 'im in, s'help me!”
He broke down then, gasping with rage and misery, his working face buried in his hands, his mighty shoulders quivering. Lizz came over to his side. She touched him gently on the arm.
“Bill, don't you tike on so. T'aint so bad. We've got our lodger. And I'll 'ave my bit of charing. We'll pull through. We've 'ad our fair weather together, my man. We must tike the rough. So long as we're together, 'o cares?”
“I'll do 'im in!” he repeated brutally and monotonously, “I'll do 'im in!”
There was a moment's silence. The child came back and replaced the half-sovereign on the table. With a precocious wisdom she had understood that Mrs. Bunbury had got to wait.
“When 'e's a millionaire, it'll be orl right,” she said thoughtfully. “'E said so. A jolly little 'ouse and more than enough to eat—that's wot 'e said.”
But no one listened to her. The door had opened again, and Peter Middleton entered with the easy familiarity of one sure of his welcome. He looked very young at that moment, and there was something in the carriage of his shoulders, in the clear eyes, that was like a gust of vigorous north wind in the close room.
“Good evening, Mrs. Higgins.”
“Evening, sir.”
“Not late am I?”
He caught Victoria-Regina from her feet, swung her up on to his shoulder and did not notice that the usual shrill squeak of delight had been omitted.
“I'm not sure that the jolly little house isn't in sight,” he whispered. “And perhaps one day you'll be so plump, Victoria-Regina, that we shall have to roll you. Mrs. Higgins, I've got good news.”
“Yes sir.” Lizz stood listlessly by the table, watching her husband, who had not moved. Her answers had come mechanically.
“Yes, I've just come from Blankley's. They seem to fancy what I told them about the brake. If it's what I say it is, they'll bring it out for me; and in the meantime I've got a job under the foreman in the testing department—”
Bill Higgins bounded to his feet. His face was scarcely recognizable. It was swollen, with great, ugly veins starting out upon the forehead, the eyes sunken and bloodshot.
“You—you black-leg!” he shouted. “You dirty, treacherous sneak-thief! I said I'd do you in and s'help me, I will.” He drew himself together like a mad bull ready to charge, his thick neck sunk between his hunched shoulders, his mighty fists raised like sledge-hammers, ready to strike his enemy to the ground. His wife screamed.
“Bill—Bill—you're mad—don't do it—Bill—"
“'E took my job—don't you say nothink—I'll make 'im pay for it—”
He lurched forward. It was then that Victoria-Regina intervened. She slipped suddenly in front of him.
“Don't you do nothink, Father,” she said fiercely. “'E's my pal. Don't you do nothink to 'im.”
The sheer audacity of the thing sent the big man reeling back a step. In his blind rage he had almost struck her, and the horror of it sobered him, changing his madness to a sullen, miserable resignation.
PETER MIDDLETON put the child gently out of his way and held out his hand.
“Mr. Higgins,” he said simply, “I'm most terribly sorry. I can see just how you feel about it, but I want you to believe that I didn't know—that I'm as miserable as you are. I'll do anything I can to put it straight. We'll share and share alike, Mr. Higgins—”
The man drew himself up. For all his clumsy build and shabby, toil-worn clothes he held himself with a certain dignity.
“We aint a-taking charity from no one, sir,” he jerked out. Love StoriesLeast of all from the likes of—from you. I meant to do you in, I did, but you're the kid's pal—and maybe I'm glad—I didn't. But you'll be good enough to get out of this to-morrow, sir. And 'ere's your money. Don't you say nothink—I—I cawn't trust myself—”
Middleton glanced from one to the other. Only Victoria-Regina looked at him frankly. Lizz avoided his eyes, and her mouth was sullen. Her husband's back was turned. Middleton made no further protest. He took up the gold-piece and put it in his pocket.
“I hope one day you'll shake hands after all, Mr. Higgins,” he said. He went out, and as the door closed, Bill shook himself like a man waking from a loathsome nightmare. Husband and wife looked at each other.
“That was our last penny,” she said dully. “And the rent's owing. Wot's we a-going to do, Bill?”
“Aw don't know.”
“Bill—” She came a step nearer, and her voice dropped. “If 'e 'adn't 'ad that invention of 'is, they wouldn't 'ave took 'im on at Blankley's?”
“Naw.”
“And if 'e'adn't got them any more—they'd think 'e'd been a-kidding them—they'd fire 'im?”
“S'pose so.”
“Then—then they might tike you back, Bill?”
Their eyes met. Victoria-Regina was forgotten.
“Maybe—”
“Bill, 'e wont 'ave those papers to-morrow—I promise you—”
“You daren't— Lizz!”
“Yes—I dares. 'E took your job. I 'ate 'im. I don't care wot 'appens to me. And don't you try to stop me, Bill. It's—it's for the kid.”
“Aw.” He picked up his cap and stood there twisting it in his hands. “I wont stop you—leastways— We've been honest folk—we've made an honest fight for it—and now I'm sick of it—sick of fighting—”
She took an involuntary step after him.
“Bill, you aint a-going to do nothing rash—Bill?”
“I'll do as much as you do—for the kid,” he retorted.
The door slammed behind him.
IT was close on midnight as Bill Higgins crossed Westminster Bridge. He walked rapidly like a man hurrying homeward, and there was nothing about him to arouse suspicion in the heart of the most misanthropic policeman. Choosing the largest thoroughfare, he made his way west to that exalted region of melancholy squares and enrailed melancholy gardens where the fashionables and would-be fashionables of the earth congregate in freewill or compulsory exclusiveness. To Bill Higgins there was nothing to differentiate between them. They were all the same,—huge, frowning monuments to the glory of an ill-gotten wealth—and inside were the same people, bloated, slothful, slave-driving plutocrats. In his hunger of body and bitterness of spirit he would willingly have blown them all to their well-merited deserts—had he possessed the power. Not having the power he chose instead a propitious moment to slip down the area steps of one of the most pompous-looking dwellings, there to wait until, the special policeman having made his rounds, the coast would be clear.
Just then a light flashed into the area, searching it from end to end like a bright evil eye, and it was only by a miracle that, cowering in a corner, Bill escaped detection. Then the pompous, familiar tread lost itself in the silence. He set to work. His complete ignorance of his new profession was atoned for by his unrivaled knowledge of bolts and locks. Within two minutes the many patent and complicated contrivances which guarded the scullery entrance had been solved, and the way lay open. He went cautiously, feeling his way along dark passages and up flights of stone stairs.
It never occurred to him to use the electric light,—the very idea of light terrified him,—and it was only when his feet trod soft, velvety carpets that he realized that without it he was helpless. He cursed under his breath—then summoning what courage he had left, switched on the light. For a moment he was dazzled—completely unnerved. It seemed to him that that flood of brilliancy must have aroused the whole household, and it was only after a long silence that he dared move or look about him.
It must be confessed that as a burglar he was not a success. To stand open-mouthed and wide-eyed in the midst of the enemy's territory is never good generalship, and for full five minutes Bill Higgins did nothing else. Such wonders as he had never even dreamed of! Soft lights, coming mysteriously from nowhere, shaded lamps, gold and white pieces of delicacy upon which no mortal being could sit without causing irreparable damage, vases, pictures, the portrait of a beautiful woman, an atmosphere of sweet-scented purity unlike anything he had ever known.
It was curious that, face to face with all this visible wealth, his rage evaporated, his desire to destroy gave place to an amazing inclination to sit down and howl bitterly. (It must be remembered in extenuation of this unmanly impulse that he had not breakfasted, nor dined, nor supped, and that the strongest under such conditions may become maudlin.) At any rate the inclination, such as it was, received a rude check. The door which he had carefully shut opened; he swung round with a gasp of terror—and faced his whilom guest, Peter Middleton.
WHICH of the two men was the more completely taken aback it would have been hard to say. Bill Higgins, fired by hatred and a galling sense of failure and disaster, recovered himself first. He made a plunge at an ineffectual drawing-room poker and advanced threateningly.
“So that's wot you are, are you?” he snarled. “Now we knows—a police 'tec, a nasty, cringing, lying 'umbug. Well, I aint a-going to be took easy—”
“Hold your tongue!” said Middleton curtly. “Do you want to arouse the whole house, man?”
Bill's arm dropped. Middleton's complete indifference paralyzed him. He had the vague feeling that in these surroundings this man was as completely in his element as he—Bill Higgins—was out of it.
“S'pose you're one of them there swell cracksmen wot one reads about,” he said sullenly.
“Hold your tongue!” Peter reiterated. He was listening intently. Somewhere downstairs a door banged. “Now there is a policeman, if you like,” he remarked calmly.
The poker clattered into the fender. Whatever courage Bill had brought to his nefarious task had wholly evaporated and he was now trembling, white-faced and pacific.
“Oh, Gawd, oh, Gawd!” he groaned. “Wot's a-going to come to Lizz and the kid—wot's a-going to 'appen to all of us? Oh, Gawd—”
“Sit down!” Peter commanded. As he saw the blank horror in his companion's eyes, he burst out laughing. “Sit down my good fellow. If you don't want to be in the police-station within ten minutes, try and look as though you were enjoying the best joke of your life. Sit down!”
Bill Higgins obeyed—chiefly because his knees had given way under him. He saw Peter Middleton cross the room, perform an incredible juggling feat with an ordinary-looking table from which arose a complete set of cut-glass bottles and glass tumblers.
“Say when!” Peter requested politely.
“Neat—neat!” Bill gasped back. He had heard a heavy step on the stairs, and his hand shook so that some of the brandy splashed onto the carpet. Middleton reproved him gently.
“That carpet cost two hundred guineas, you know,” he said.
Bill choked over the brandy and his own increased despair.
“They'll make it ten years more for that! Oh, 'eavings!”
AT that critical moment Constable X 455 made his appearance and the tableau was complete. Peter Middleton had taken up his position in front of the fireplace. He was lighting a cigar, and a tumbler full of brandy stood at agreeable proximity on the mantelshelf.
“Good evening, Constable,” he said pleasantly. “Anything wrong?”
The incomparable impertinence of his attitude and question seemed to hold Constable X 455 in a state of open-mouthed bewilderment. Judging from his drawn truncheon he had come prepared for a deadly encounter, and it was only gradually that a very legal smile relaxed the ferocious pugnacity of his expression.
“You're a nice couple!” he said genially. “Making yourselves at home eh? Sorry to interrupt, but I'm afraid you'll have to come round and explain matters at headquarters—”
“My good fellow—”
The constable raised his hand solemnly.
“It is my duty to warn you that anything you may say will be taken down against you as evidence!” he announced. “Now then—”
“Are you trying to arrest a man for being in his own house?”
“Own house? Don't you try those tricks on me. I saw you and your friend there sneaking in by the kitchen door.” He pointed an accusatory finger at Bill Higgins' tools, which peered out unabashed from that unhappy man's pockets. “I suppose you'll be telling me that those are latchkeys next,” he said humorously.
Middleton laughed.
“I see you can take a joke,” he said. “As a matter of fact it was an unusual way of getting in, but I had a bet with my friend here—Lord Billingsgate—that he could not break into my house without being caught. Thanks to your vigilance I have won my bet. Have a glass of whisky, officer?”
“Look here, I've had enough cheek. Are you coming?”
“Thanks—I'm very happy here. An Englishman's house—”
“This isn't your home, my fine bird. Are you Mr. Middleton, perhaps?”
“Yes, I am Mr. Middleton.”
“Mr. Middleton is in East Africa—”
“No, he isn't. He's on his native hearth drinking a brandy-and-soda.”
“You'll have to prove that.”
“With pleasure. Lord Billingsgate, “will you be so kind as to touch the electric button on your right? Thank you.” He turned affably to the red-faced constable. “The bell communicates with my wife's room,” he explained. “That is my private signal when I am at home. She will be down in a moment, and then your doubts will be set at rest. Have another brandy, my dear Billingsgate. You look pale.”
“My Dear Billingsgate” made no intelligible answer. In his aching brain one mad possibility jolted against another and produced total chaos. The only thing he saw clearly was the dock, a stern-faced judge, his wife and Victoria-Regina weeping bitterly, and row after row of policemen. He tugged at Middleton's sleeve.
“Own up!' he whispered hoarsely. “It aint no use bluffing like that. They'll make it worse for us—own up for 'eaving's sake, man!”
“Do try and keep calm for just a few minutes!” Middleton begged. “Ah, here is Mrs. Middleton herself!”
Bill Higgins sprang to his feet. He thought the picture hanging over the mantelpiece had come to life—with alterations which he had not the art or presence of mind to recognize, For instance, instead of a Paquin gown the lady wore a negligee of cloudy lace, and instead of diamonds nothing but a ribbon in her loose-flowing golden hair. Her face had been very pale as she entered. Now as she looked from one to the other, it lighted up with a suppressed laughter which threatened to bubble over as she encountered Peter Middleton's eyes.
“My dear Peter,” she said, “if you would only remember not to smoke in the drawing-room!”
“My dear, I'm most awfully sorry—I forgot. It's such a long time ago, you know!”
And then quite calmly and naturally he kissed her.
Bill Higgins and the constable exchanged involuntary glances. Being both equally thunderstruck, they were for the moment almost friendly toward each other. The constable removed his helmet and mopped a troubled forehead.
“Seems I have made a mistake,” he said. “Sorry, ma'am, but I saw them two—two gentlemen come in by the back way, and I thought it queer.” He gave Lord Billingsgate a look of profound suspicion. “I hope everything's all right, ma'am!”
“Quite right, thank you.” She smiled graciously. “I shall not forget your vigilance—Sergeant.”
From the lowest depths of discomfiture and doubt Police-constable X 455 rose on that winged word “sergeant” to reeling heights of self-importance. He saluted with dignity.
“I only did my dooty, Your Ladyship. I'll just see that the back door's all right. I wish Your Ladyship good night.”
AND having thus delicately repaid the compliment, he made a heavy and pompous retreat down the front stairs. Mrs. Middleton closed the door softly after him and stood with her back to it. The color had left her cheeks again, and when she spoke, her voice sounded unexpectedly strained and breathless,
“Peter—have you really taken to this sort of thing?”
“Would you mind if I had?” he questioned back.
“Not—not so long as it was always my—our house and it was always I who caught you.”
“Supposing it was somebody else's house—supposing there was no fairy person to rescue me?”
“Then—then it wouldn't make any difference—except that I should have to bail you out, dear.”
He looked hastily away as though to hide his expression.
“Well, you wont have to do that. I'm not clever enough for this business. I just happened to—to be round here and I saw some one come in—”
For the first time in the course of the proceedings Bill Higgins took a definite and independent part. He came forward, cap in hand, and stood awkwardly before her, the guilty instruments bulging out of his pockets, his eyes despairing but resolute.
“It was me, ma'am,” be blurted out, “me, not 'im. I burgled your 'ouse, and if 'e 'adn't 'elped me, I should be in the lock-up now, I should. And quite right too. I'm a bad lot, I am.” He faced Middleton almost fiercely. “If you'd known, sir, you wouldn't 'ave done it— you wouldn't 'ave stuck up for me. I'm a low-down cove—I—burnt your papers—I did—you can knock me down with a feather, sir. I sha'n't raise a 'and—”
“Peter, what papers?”
She had seen the gray pallor steal over Middleton's face and with an instinctive compassion and tenderness had placed her white hands on his shoulders. “Peter, what is it?”
He smiled wanly.
“Nothing—only a little invention of mine—a mere nothing—only I had hoped—it would help me on the way back—to you.”
“And you burnt it?” she flashed at the man standing miserably beside her. “You burnt it?”
“I'm a low-down cove,” he repeated hoarsely. “But I'll go quiet—s'help me, Gawd.”
THERE was a little silence.
“I don't think Mr. Higgins does himself justice,” said Peter at last very quietly. “He hasn't told you that it was I who turned him out of his job. He hasn't told you that he is hungry and he has a wife and child—starving in a little back-street garret. That all makes a difference. It—it explains things.”
Mrs. Middleton looked from one man to the other.
“Starving!” she echoed blankly. “Starving—and this morning I gave that old fossil one hundred pounds for his organ!”
“There's lots worse than me, ma'am,” Bill Higgins put in humbly. “It aint all our fault, ma'am—we don't mean no 'arm.”
Mrs. Middleton released herself firmly from her husband's arm.
“Mr. Higgins, will you please fetch a taxi?”
“A—a policeman, ma'am?”
“No, only a taxi. Peter, go down into the larder and steal anything suitable or unsuitable that you can lay hands on. And—let me see—fetch up two bottles of port from the cellar. I shall be ready in ten minutes.”
She had reached the first landing before he overtook her.
“My dear child, do you realize that it is past one o'clock?”
“My dear Peter,” she mocked back over her shoulder, “we think nothing of amusing ourselves at three o'clock in the morning—I intend varying the monotony by doing a fellow-creature a good turn at 1:30 a.m. Are you going to that larder or not?”
“I daren't. Your cook will give notice.”
“I defy Cook.” She bent down from her superior elevation and shook a significant finger. “Mr. Peter Middleton, I have a horrible premonition that my sole authority in this house will soon be coming to an end, and I mean to enjoy my hour. Will you do as you're told?”
“I will—if you kiss me!”
Downstairs Mr. William Higgins gazed at the portrait over the mantelpiece as though at the vision of a saint, and two large tears rolled down his gaunt cheeks and fell unheeded on the two-hundred-guinea carpet.
“LOW fever, that's what it is.” The doctor replaced his thermometer in his pocket and concealed a grimace made in the direction of the glorified soap-box. “Give her plenty of milk, eggs and cream and she'll be all right. Nourishing food is what she wants—”
“P'r'aps a little champagne?” Lizz suggested bitterly.
“Well—perhaps—in small quantities. Don't overdo it. I'll drop in, in a day or two. Good night!”
The door slammed, and Lizz tiptoed back to the soap-box and bent over the restlessly tossing occupant. Emily Victoria-Regina's eyes were wide open. They were very bright, and there was a color in the pinched cheeks which awoke a vague hope in Lizz's untutored mind.
“Feelin' a bit better now, aren't yer?”
“Don't know—s'pose so. Got a pain—'ere.”
“Where?”
“'Ere.” She indicated the exact spot. “It gnaws,” she added crisply and graphically, “—like mice.”
Her mother digested this description slowly.
“Sounds as though you might be 'ungry,” she said. “Doctor didn't think of that. Are you 'ungry, Vicky?”
“S'pose so.”
“'Ave a bit of bread?”
“There aint no bread,” was the weary rejoinder, “—only crusts.”
Lizz rose slowly to her feet. She glanced at the despised edibles lying in solitary state on the table and then at the closed door leading into the lodger's room. All the gentleness had left her rough features. Her hands were clenched. Softly she crossed to: where the candle flickered unsteadily on the mantelshelf.
The door creaked as she opened it. By the frail, uncertain light she saw the papers lying in neat order by the lodger's half-filled traveling-bag. She picked them up.
“I aint never done such a thing,” she muttered, “—never. But I promised—it's for Vicky.”
“Mother!”
The husky little voice sounded loud in the stillness. The papers dropped from the trembling hands.
“Yus—wot is it?”
“I want somethink to drink—I'm all dried up inside.”
“Oh, orl right—I'm a-coming.”
With a short, stifled sigh of relief she picked up an empty water-jug and crept out onto the landing and down the rickety stairs. The general tap had been placed in the yard for the greater convenience of the ten families inhabiting the building, and five minutes had passed before her return.
Victoria-Regina sighed drowsily.
“I believe I could sleep a bit now,” she muttered. “You wont wake me, Mother?”
“No fear—just you sleep, baby.”
VICTORIA-REGINA cuddled down deeper into the soap-box. Her mother waited for a moment, listening, then crept back to the empty room. Her knees shook under her. In the street below, a motor-horn tooted pompously, and somehow the unusual sound goaded her to action. It was now or never—in a minute it might be too late. She groped across the table with frantic hands—and then like a thunderbolt it burst upon her—the papers were gone. She almost screamed. But there was no time for her to reason out the incredible fact. Footsteps sounded on the wooden stairs—many footsteps. She could hear voices. To her distraught fancy the room was already full of accusers and burly policemen. She would be caught redhanded. And who would believe her story? No one.
Then the door opened and Peter Middleton entered. She saw him and nothing else until suddenly she found her husband at her side.
“Lizz!” he gasped. “Them papers—you 'aven't done it?”
“They're gone!” she answered stupidly.
“Oh, Gawd!” He swung round and faced Middleton, half defiant, half pleading. 'Don't you do nothink to 'er, sir. It wasn't 'er, sir. It was me—I told 'er to—”
“'E didn't!” she broke in fiercely. “It was me—I did it—I did it—”
“'Ere!” interrupted Victoria-Regina, “'Ere?
All three turned with a start. Victoria-Regina, arrayed in an old blanket and very little else, had made a dramatic entry. She crossed over to Middleton's side with a dignity that, considering a wabbly pair of legs and the inconveniences of the blanket, was impressive. Peter caught her up in his arms. “'Ere!“ she repeated hoarsely. “'Ere they are! I've been lying on 'em. I thought, as we was pals, I ought to keep 'em for you. I thought as 'ow you were all square at the bottom.”
“Victoria-Regina!” Peter said. His precious plans—rather warm and crumpled—were in his hands. He hugged them and the small blanket-clad figure in an ecstasy of delight. “Emily Victoria-Regina Higgins, you're the best, squarest, cleverest pal I ever heard of—”
“Really, Peter!” said Mrs. Middleton from the doorway. In that dimly lit, poverty-stricken garret she looked like an emissary from a fairy world who, as a protective against the English climate, had wrapped herself in furs. On either arm she carried a basket from whence protruded strange and bulgy objects. “Really, Peter,” she repeated breathlessly, “you are an incorrigible scatter-brains! Leaving me with all this to carry! Mrs. Higgins, I apologize for my husband. I hear he has been causing you a lot of bother. Well, it's nothing to the bother he causes me, and if you had burnt his drawings, I should have said it served him right. Anyhow, we've come to straighten things up for you all—and—and as it's so late, and we're awfully hungry, we brought our supper with us.”
THE grave improbability of this statement was lost on Mrs. Higgins, who was still working out the details of Victoria-Regina's extraordinary duplicity and alternately mopping her eyes and squeezing her husband's hand. Fortunately Mrs. Middleton was complete master of the situation. Within five minutes she had unpacked the baskets and revealed a collection of edibles which boded ill for the next day: lobsters, chickens, caviar, pâté de foie gras—things the Higgins family had never seen or heard of and at which they gaped helplessly while the head stuttered out incoherent explanations.
“'E's a gent,” he said. “'E wouldn't give me up—not even when I told 'im wot I thought you'd done. I tikes back wot I said about millionaires. They're gents—and real lidies too,” he added shyly.
“And now,” said Mrs. Middleton, “if Mrs. Higgins will wrap up Victoria-Regina in a manner likely to prevent her catching her death of cold, we'll sit down.”
There were only two chairs, so Mr. Higgins sat on the edge of the table and Mr. Middleton on the reversed soap-box (alias Victoria-Regina's bed) and Victoria-Regina herself on Mrs. Middleton's lap. As there were only two forks, the gentlemen ate after the manner Of their forefathers and proved themselves highly proficient. As to Mrs. Middleton, she performed prodigies with the lobsters—pour encourager les autres.
So it was not a refined feast but a very cheerful one. They discussed the future, and at the end of it all Mr. Bill Higgins rose with his own particular bottle—there were no glasses—and proposed a toast.
“To that there millennium wot's come and them wot's brought it and Gawd bless 'em!”
“'Ear! 'Ear!” said Lizz fervently.
“'Ear! 'Ear!” in sleepy after-dinner accents from Victoria-Regina. Then she wriggled and squeezed Mrs. Middleton's hand. “You're just as pretty as wot my pal said,” she whispered into her ear. “Just!”
Mrs. Middleton blushed.
IT was past three o'clock as Peter Middleton helped his wife into the waiting taxi. She leaned out of the window.
“If the invention's a great success, you'll come back, Peter?”
“Yes—of course.”
“Not until then?” she asked wistfully.
“I can't.”
“Say something nice, Peter!”
He shook his head. The taxi jerked forward.
“Peter—there's one thing I still don't understand—”
“Yes?”
“What were you doing skulking round my—our house at midnight?”
“Looking at your window.”
“Peter—”
But the taxi-driver, being a man of no tact, had already driven on.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1930.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1959, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 65 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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