MRS. BATHURST
FROM LYDEN'S "IRENIUS"
ACT III. Sc. II.
Gow.--Had it been your Prince instead of a groom caught in this noose
there's not an astrologer of the city----
PRINCE.--Sacked! Sacked! We were a city yesterday.
Gow.--So be it, but I was not governor. Not an astrologer, but would ha'
sworn he'd foreseen it at the last versary of Venus, when Vulcan caught
her with Mars in the house of stinking Capricorn. But since 'tis Jack of
the Straw that hangs, the forgetful stars had it not on their tablets.
PRINCE.--Another life! Were there any left to die? How did the
poor fool come by it?
Gow.--_Simpliciter_ thus. She that damned him to death knew not that she
did it, or would have died ere she had done it. For she loved him. He
that hangs him does so in obedience to the Duke, and asks no more than
"Where is the rope?" The Duke, very exactly he hath told us, works God's
will, in which holy employ he's not to be questioned. We have then left
upon this finger, only Jack whose soul now plucks the left sleeve of
Destiny in Hell to overtake why she clapped him up like a fly on a sunny
wall. Whuff! Soh!
PRINCE.--Your cloak, Ferdinand. I'll sleep now.
FERDINAND.--Sleep, then.. He too, loved his life?
Gow.--He was born of woman ... but at the end threw life from
him, like your Prince, for a little sleep ... "Have I any look of a
King?" said he, clanking his chain--"to be so baited on all sides by
Fortune, that I must e'en die now to live with myself one day longer?" I
left him railing at Fortune and woman's love.
FERDINAND.--Ah, woman's love!
_(Aside)_ Who knows not Fortune, glutted on easy thrones, Stealing from
feasts as rare to coneycatch, Privily in the hedgerows for a clown With
that same cruel-lustful hand and eye, Those nails and wedges, that one
hammer and lead, And the very gerb of long-stored lightnings loosed
Yesterday 'gainst some King.
MRS. BATHURST
The day that I chose to visit H.M.S. _Peridot_ in Simon's Bay was the day
that the Admiral had chosen to send her up the coast. She was just
steaming out to sea as my train came in, and since the rest of the Fleet
were either coaling or busy at the rifle-ranges a thousand feet up the
hill, I found myself stranded, lunchless, on the sea-front with no hope of
return to Cape Town before five P.M. At this crisis I had the luck to come
across my friend Inspector Hooper, Cape Government Railways, in command of
an engine and a brake-van chalked for repair.
"If you get something to eat," he said, "I'll run you down to Glengariff
siding till the goods comes along. It's cooler there than here, you see."
I got food and drink from the Greeks who sell all things at a price, and
the engine trotted us a couple of miles up the line to a bay of drifted
sand and a plank-platform half buried in sand not a hundred yards from the
edge of the surf. Moulded dunes, whiter than any snow, rolled far inland
up a brown and purple valley of splintered rocks and dry scrub. A crowd of
Malays hauled at a net beside two blue and green boats on the beach; a
picnic party danced and shouted barefoot where a tiny river trickled
across the flat, and a circle of dry hills, whose feet were set in sands
of silver, locked us in against a seven-coloured sea. At either horn of
the bay the railway line, cut just above high water-mark, ran round a
shoulder of piled rocks, and disappeared.
"You see there's always a breeze here," said Hooper, opening the door as
the engine left us in the siding on the sand, and the strong south-easter
buffeting under Elsie's Peak dusted sand into our tickey beer. Presently
he sat down to a file full of spiked documents. He had returned from a
long trip up-country, where he had been reporting on damaged rolling-
stock, as far away as Rhodesia. The weight of the bland wind on my
eyelids; the song of it under the car roof, and high up among the rocks;
the drift of fine grains chasing each other musically ashore; the tramp of
the surf; the voices of the picnickers; the rustle of Hooper's file, and
the presence of the assured sun, joined with the beer to cast me into
magical slumber. The hills of False Bay were just dissolving into those of
fairyland when I heard footsteps on the sand outside, and the clink of our
couplings.
"Stop that!" snapped Hooper, without raising his head from his work. "It's
those dirty little Malay boys, you see: they're always playing with the
trucks...."
"Don't be hard on 'em. The railway's a general refuge in Africa," I
replied.
"'Tis--up-country at any rate. That reminds me," he felt in his waistcoat-
pocket, "I've got a curiosity for you from Wankies--beyond Buluwayo. It's
more of a souvenir perhaps than----"
"The old hotel's inhabited," cried a voice. "White men from the language.
Marines to the front! Come on, Pritch. Here's your Belmont. Wha--i--i!"
The last word dragged like a rope as Mr. Pyecroft ran round to the open
door, and stood looking up into my face. Behind him an enormous Sergeant
of Marines trailed a stalk of dried seaweed, and dusted the sand nervously
from his fingers.
"What are you doing here?" I asked. "I thought the _Hierophant_ was down
the coast?"
"We came in last Tuesday--from Tristan D'Acunha--for overhaul, and we
shall be in dockyard 'ands for two months, with boiler-seatings."
"Come and sit down," Hooper put away the file.
"This is Mr. Hooper of the Railway," I exclaimed, as Pyecroft turned to
haul up the black-moustached sergeant.
"This is Sergeant Pritchard, of the _Agaric_, an old shipmate," said he.
"We were strollin' on the beach." The monster blushed and nodded. He
filled up one side of the van when he sat down.
"And this is my friend, Mr. Pyecroft," I added to Hooper, already busy
with the extra beer which my prophetic soul had bought from the Greeks.
"_Moi aussi_" quoth Pyecroft, and drew out beneath his coat a labelled
quart bottle.
"Why, it's Bass," cried Hooper.
"It was Pritchard," said Pyecroft. "They can't resist him."
"That's not so," said Pritchard, mildly.
"Not _verbatim_ per'aps, but the look in the eye came to the same thing."
"Where was it?" I demanded.
"Just on beyond here--at Kalk Bay. She was slappin' a rug in a back
verandah. Pritch hadn't more than brought his batteries to bear, before
she stepped indoors an' sent it flyin' over the wall."
Pyecroft patted the warm bottle.
"It was all a mistake," said Pritchard. "I shouldn't wonder if she mistook
me for Maclean. We're about of a size."
I had heard householders of Muizenburg, St. James's, and Kalk Bay complain
of the difficulty of keeping beer or good servants at the seaside, and I
began to see the reason. None the less, it was excellent Bass, and I too
drank to the health of that large-minded maid.
"It's the uniform that fetches 'em, an' they fetch it," said Pyecroft. "My
simple navy blue is respectable, but not fascinatin'. Now Pritch in 'is
Number One rig is always 'purr Mary, on the terrace'--_ex officio_ as you
might say."
"She took me for Maclean, I tell you," Pritchard insisted. "Why--why--to
listen to him you wouldn't think that only yesterday----"
"Pritch," said Pyecroft, "be warned in time. If we begin tellin' what we
know about each other we'll be turned out of the pub. Not to mention
aggravated desertion on several occasions----"
"Never anything more than absence without leaf--I defy you to prove it,"
said the Sergeant hotly. "An' if it comes to that how about Vancouver in
'87?"
"How about it? Who pulled bow in the gig going ashore? Who told Boy
Niven...?"
"Surely you were court martialled for that?" I said. The story of Boy
Niven who lured seven or eight able-bodied seamen and marines into the
woods of British Columbia used to be a legend of the Fleet.
"Yes, we were court-martialled to rights," said Pritchard, "but we should
have been tried for murder if Boy Niven 'adn't been unusually tough. He
told us he had an uncle 'oo'd give us land to farm. 'E said he was born at
the back o' Vancouver Island, and _all_ the time the beggar was a balmy
Barnado Orphan!"
"_But_ we believed him," said Pyecroft. "I did--you did--Paterson did--an'
'oo was the Marine that married the cocoanut-woman afterwards--him with
the mouth?"
"Oh, Jones, Spit-Kid Jones. I 'aven't thought of 'im in years," said
Pritchard. "Yes, Spit-Kid believed it, an' George Anstey and Moon. We were
very young an' very curious."
"_But_ lovin' an' trustful to a degree," said Pyecroft.
"Remember when 'e told us to walk in single file for fear o' bears?
'Remember, Pye, when 'e 'opped about in that bog full o' ferns an' sniffed
an' said 'e could smell the smoke of 'is uncle's farm? An' _all_ the time
it was a dirty little out-lyin' uninhabited island. We walked round it in
a day, an' come back to our boat lyin' on the beach. A whole day Boy Niven
kept us walkin' in circles lookin' for 'is uncle's farm! He said his uncle
was compelled by the law of the land to give us a farm!"
"Don't get hot, Pritch. We believed," said Pyecroft.
"He'd been readin' books. He only did it to get a run ashore an' have
himself talked of. A day an' a night--eight of us--followin' Boy Niven
round an uninhabited island in the Vancouver archipelago! Then the picket
came for us an' a nice pack o' idiots we looked!"
"What did you get for it?" Hooper asked.
"Heavy thunder with continuous lightning for two hours. Thereafter sleet-
squalls, a confused sea, and cold, unfriendly weather till conclusion o'
cruise," said Pyecroft. "It was only what we expected, but what we felt,
an' I assure you, Mr. Hooper, even a sailor-man has a heart to break, was
bein' told that we able seamen an' promisin' marines 'ad misled Boy Niven.
Yes, we poor back-to-the-landers was supposed to 'ave misled him! He
rounded on us, o' course, an' got off easy."
"Excep' for what we gave him in the steerin'-flat when we came out o'
cells. 'Eard anything of 'im lately, Pye?"
"Signal Boatswain in the Channel Fleet, I believe--Mr. L.L. Niven is."
"An' Anstey died o' fever in Benin," Pritchard mused. "What come to Moon?
Spit-Kid we know about."
"Moon--Moon! Now where did I last...? Oh yes, when I was in the
_Palladium_! I met Quigley at Buncrana Station. He told me Moon 'ad run
when the _Astrild_ sloop was cruising among the South Seas three years
back. He always showed signs o' bein' a Mormonastic beggar. Yes, he
slipped off quietly an' they 'adn't time to chase 'im round the islands
even if the navigatin' officer 'ad been equal to the job."
"Wasn't he?" said Hooper.
"Not so. Accordin' to Quigley the _Astrild_ spent half her commission
rompin' up the beach like a she-turtle, an' the other half hatching
turtles' eggs on the top o' numerous reefs. When she was docked at Sydney
her copper looked like Aunt Maria's washing on the line--an' her 'midship
frames was sprung. The commander swore the dockyard 'ad done it haulin'
the pore thing on to the slips. They _do_ do strange things at sea, Mr.
Hooper."
"Ah! I'm not a tax-payer," said Hooper, and opened a fresh bottle. The
Sergeant seemed to be one who had a difficulty in dropping subjects.
"How it all comes back, don't it?" he said. "Why Moon must 'ave 'ad
sixteen years' service before he ran."
"It takes 'em at all ages. Look at--you know," said Pyecroft.
"Who?" I asked.
"A service man within eighteen months of his pension, is the party you're
thinkin' of," said Pritchard. "A warrant 'oose name begins with a V.,
isn't it?"
"But, in a way o' puttin' it, we can't say that he actually did desert,"
Pyecroft suggested.
"Oh, no," said Pritchard. "It was only permanent absence up country
without leaf. That was all."
"Up country?" said Hooper. "Did they circulate his description?"
"What for?" said Pritchard, most impolitely.
"Because deserters are like columns in the war. They don't move away from
the line, you see. I've known a chap caught at Salisbury that way tryin'
to get to Nyassa. They tell me, but o' course I don't know, that they
don't ask questions on the Nyassa Lake Flotilla up there. I've heard of a
P. and O. quartermaster in full command of an armed launch there."
"Do you think Click 'ud ha' gone up that way?" Pritchard asked.
"There's no saying. He was sent up to Bloemfontein to take over some Navy
ammunition left in the fort. We know he took it over and saw it into the
trucks. Then there was no more Click--then or thereafter. Four months ago
it transpired, and thus the _casus belli_ stands at present," said
Pyecroft.
"What were his marks?" said Hooper again.
"Does the Railway get a reward for returnin' 'em, then?" said Pritchard.
"If I did d'you suppose I'd talk about it?" Hooper retorted angrily.
"You seemed so very interested," said Pritchard with equal crispness.
"Why was he called Click?" I asked to tide over an uneasy little break in
the conversation. The two men were staring at each other very fixedly.
"Because of an ammunition hoist carryin' away," said Pyecroft. "And it
carried away four of 'is teeth--on the lower port side, wasn't it, Pritch?
The substitutes which he bought weren't screwed home in a manner o'
sayin'. When he talked fast they used to lift a little on the bed plate.
'Ence, 'Click.' They called 'im a superior man which is what we'd call a
long, black-'aired, genteely speakin', 'alf-bred beggar on the lower
deck."
"Four false teeth on the lower left jaw," said Hooper, his hand in his
waistcoat pocket. "What tattoo marks?"
"Look here," began Pritchard, half rising. "I'm sure we're very grateful
to you as a gentleman for your 'orspitality, but per'aps we may 'ave made
an error in--"
I looked at Pyecroft for aid, Hooper was crimsoning rapidly.
"If the fat marine now occupying the foc'sle will kindly bring 'is _status
quo_ to an anchor yet once more, we may be able to talk like gentlemen--
not to say friends," said Pyecroft. "He regards you, Mr. Hooper, as a
emissary of the Law."
"I only wish to observe that when a gentleman exhibits such a peculiar, or
I should rather say, such a _bloomin'_ curiosity in identification marks
as our friend here----"
"Mr. Pritchard," I interposed, "I'll take all the responsibility for Mr.
Hooper."
"An' _you_'ll apologise all round," said Pyecroft. "You're a rude little
man, Pritch."
"But how was I----" he began, wavering.
"I don't know an' I don't care. Apologise!"
The giant looked round bewildered and took our little hands into his vast
grip, one by one. "I was wrong," he said meekly as a sheep. "My suspicions
was unfounded. Mr. Hooper, I apologise."
"You did quite right to look out for your own end o' the line," said
Hooper. "I'd ha' done the same with a gentleman I didn't know, you see. If
you don't mind I'd like to hear a little more o' your Mr. Vickery. It's
safe with me, you see."
"Why did Vickery run," I began, but Pyecroft's smile made me turn my
question to "Who was she?"
"She kep' a little hotel at Hauraki--near Auckland," said Pyecroft.
"By Gawd!" roared Pritchard, slapping his hand on his leg. "Not Mrs.
Bathurst!"
Pyecroft nodded slowly, and the Sergeant called all the powers of darkness
to witness his bewilderment.
"So far as I could get at it Mrs. B. was the lady in question."
"But Click was married," cried Pritchard.
"An' 'ad a fifteen year old daughter. 'E's shown me her photograph.
Settin' that aside, so to say, 'ave you ever found these little things
make much difference? Because I haven't."
"Good Lord Alive an' Watchin'!... Mrs. Bathurst...." Then with another
roar: "You can say what you please, Pye, but you don't make me believe it
was any of 'er fault. She wasn't _that!_"
"If I was going to say what I please, I'd begin by callin' you a silly ox
an' work up to the higher pressures at leisure. I'm trying to say solely
what transpired. M'rover, for once you're right. It wasn't her fault."
"You couldn't 'aven't made me believe it if it 'ad been," was the answer.
Such faith in a Sergeant of Marines interested me greatly. "Never mind
about that," I cried. "Tell me what she was like."
"She was a widow," said Pyecroft. "Left so very young and never
re-spliced. She kep' a little hotel for warrants and non-coms close to
Auckland, an' she always wore black silk, and 'er neck--"
"You ask what she was like," Pritchard broke in. "Let me give you an
instance. I was at Auckland first in '97, at the end o' the _Marroquin's_
commission, an' as I'd been promoted I went up with the others. She used
to look after us all, an' she never lost by it--not a penny! 'Pay me now,'
she'd say, 'or settle later. I know you won't let me suffer. Send the
money from home if you like,' Why, gentlemen all, I tell you I've seen
that lady take her own gold watch an' chain off her neck in the bar an'
pass it to a bosun 'oo'd come ashore without 'is ticker an' 'ad to catch
the last boat. 'I don't know your name,' she said, 'but when you've done
with it, you'll find plenty that know me on the front. Send it back by one
o' them.' And it was worth thirty pounds if it was worth 'arf a crown. The
little gold watch, Pye, with the blue monogram at the back. But, as I was
sayin', in those days she kep' a beer that agreed with me--Slits it was
called. One way an' another I must 'ave punished a good few bottles of it
while we was in the bay--comin' ashore every night or so. Chaffin across
the bar like, once when we were alone, 'Mrs. B.,' I said, 'when next I
call I want you to remember that this is my particular--just as you're my
particular?' (She'd let you go _that_ far!) 'Just as you're my
particular,' I said. 'Oh, thank you, Sergeant Pritchard,' she says, an'
put 'er hand up to the curl be'ind 'er ear. Remember that way she had,
Pye?"
"I think so," said the sailor.
"Yes, 'Thank you, Sergeant Pritchard,' she says. 'The least I can do is to
mark it for you in case you change your mind. There's no great demand for
it in the Fleet,' she says, 'but to make sure I'll put it at the back o'
the shelf,' an' she snipped off a piece of her hair ribbon with that old
dolphin cigar cutter on the bar--remember it, Pye?--an' she tied a bow
round what was left--just four bottles. That was '97--no, '96. In '98 I
was in the _Resiliant_--China station--full commission. In Nineteen One,
mark you, I was in the _Carthusian_, back in Auckland Bay again. Of course
I went up to Mrs. B.'s with the rest of us to see how things were goin'.
They were the same as ever. (Remember the big tree on the pavement by the
side-bar, Pye?) I never said anythin' in special (there was too many of us
talkin' to her), but she saw me at once."
"That wasn't difficult?" I ventured.
"Ah, but wait. I was comin' up to the bar, when, 'Ada,' she says to her
niece, 'get me Sergeant Pritchard's particular,' and, gentlemen all, I
tell you before I could shake 'ands with the lady, there were those four
bottles o' Slits, with 'er 'air ribbon in a bow round each o' their necks,
set down in front o' me, an' as she drew the cork she looked at me under
her eyebrows in that blindish way she had o' lookin', an', 'Sergeant
Pritchard,' she says, 'I do 'ope you 'aven't changed your mind about your
particulars.' That's the kind o' woman she was--after five years!"
"I don't _see_ her yet somehow," said Hooper, but with sympathy.
"She--she never scrupled to feed a lame duck or set 'er foot on a scorpion
at any time of 'er life," Pritchard added valiantly.
"That don't help me either. My mother's like that for one."
The giant heaved inside his uniform and rolled his eyes at the car-roof.
Said Pyecroft suddenly:--
"How many women have you been intimate with all over the world, Pritch?"
Pritchard blushed plum colour to the short hairs of his seventeen-inch
neck.
"'Undreds," said Pyecroft. "So've I. How many of 'em can you remember in
your own mind, settin' aside the first--an' per'aps the last--_and one
more_?"
"Few, wonderful few, now I tax myself," said Sergeant Pritchard,
relievedly.
"An' how many times might you 'ave been at Aukland?"
"One--two," he began. "Why, I can't make it more than three times in ten
years. But I can remember every time that I ever saw Mrs. B."
"So can I--an' I've only been to Auckland twice--how she stood an' what
she was sayin' an' what she looked like. That's the secret. 'Tisn't
beauty, so to speak, nor good talk necessarily. It's just It. Some
women'll stay in a man's memory if they once walked down a street, but
most of 'em you can live with a month on end, an' next commission you'd be
put to it to certify whether they talked in their sleep or not, as one
might say."
"Ah," said Hooper. "That's more the idea. I've known just two women of
that nature."
"An' it was no fault o' theirs?" asked Pritchard.
"None whatever. I know that!"
"An' if a man gets struck with that kind o' woman, Mr. Hooper?" Pritchard
went on.
"He goes crazy--or just saves himself," was the slow answer.
"You've hit it," said the Sergeant. "You've seen an' known somethin' in
the course o' your life, Mr. Hooper. I'm lookin' at you!" He set down his
bottle.
"And how often had Vickery seen her?" I asked.
"That's the dark an' bloody mystery," Pyecroft answered. "I'd never come
across him till I come out in the _Hierophant_ just now, an' there wasn't
any one in the ship who knew much about him. You see, he was what you call
a superior man. 'E spoke to me once or twice about Auckland and Mrs. B. on
the voyage out. I called that to mind subsequently. There must 'ave been a
good deal between 'em, to my way o' thinkin'. Mind you I'm only giving you
my _sum_ of it all, because all I know is second-hand so to speak, or
rather I should say more than second-'and."
"How?" said Hooper peremptorily. "You must have seen it or heard it."
"Yes," said Pyecroft. "I used to think seein' and hearin' was the only
regulation aids to ascertainin' facts, but as we get older we get more
accommodatin'. The cylinders work easier, I suppose.... Were you in Cape
Town last December when Phyllis's Circus came?"
"No--up country," said Hooper, a little nettled at the change of venue.
"I ask because they had a new turn of a scientific nature called 'Home and
Friends for a Tickey.'"
"Oh, you mean the cinematograph--the pictures of prize-fights and
steamers. I've seen 'em up country."
"Biograph or cinematograph was what I was alludin' to. London Bridge with
the omnibuses--a troopship goin' to the war--marines on parade at
Portsmouth an' the Plymouth Express arrivin' at Paddin'ton."
"Seen 'em all. Seen 'em all," said Hooper impatiently.
"We _Hierophants_ came in just before Christmas week an' leaf was easy."
"I think a man gets fed up with Cape Town quicker than anywhere else on
the station. Why, even Durban's more like Nature. We was there for
Christmas," Pritchard put in.
"Not bein' a devotee of Indian _peeris_, as our Doctor said to the Pusser,
I can't exactly say. Phyllis's was good enough after musketry practice at
Mozambique. I couldn't get off the first two or three nights on account of
what you might call an imbroglio with our Torpedo Lieutenant in the
submerged flat, where some pride of the West country had sugared up a
gyroscope; but I remember Vickery went ashore with our Carpenter Rigdon--
old Crocus we called him. As a general rule Crocus never left 'is ship
unless an' until he was 'oisted out with a winch, but _when_ 'e went 'e
would return noddin' like a lily gemmed with dew. We smothered him down
below that night, but the things 'e said about Vickery as a fittin'
playmate for a Warrant Officer of 'is cubic capacity, before we got him
quiet, was what I should call pointed."
"I've been with Crocus--in the _Redoubtable_," said the Sergeant. "He's a
character if there is one."
"Next night I went into Cape Town with Dawson and Pratt; but just at the
door of the Circus I came across Vickery. 'Oh!' he says, 'you're the man
I'm looking for. Come and sit next me. This way to the shillin' places!'
I went astern at once, protestin' because tickey seats better suited my
so-called finances. 'Come on,' says Vickery, 'I'm payin'.' Naturally I
abandoned Pratt and Dawson in anticipation o' drinks to match the seats.
'No,' he says, when this was 'inted--'not now. Not now. As many as you
please afterwards, but I want you sober for the occasion.' I caught 'is
face under a lamp just then, an' the appearance of it quite cured me of my
thirsts. Don't mistake. It didn't frighten me. It made me anxious. I can't
tell you what it was like, but that was the effect which it 'ad on me. If
you want to know, it reminded me of those things in bottles in those
herbalistic shops at Plymouth--preserved in spirits of wine. White an'
crumply things--previous to birth as you might say."
"You 'ave a beastial mind, Pye," said the Sergeant, relighting his pipe.
"Perhaps. We were in the front row, an' 'Home an' Friends' came on early.
Vickery touched me on the knee when the number went up. 'If you see
anything that strikes you,' he says, 'drop me a hint'; then he went on
clicking. We saw London Bridge an' so forth an' so on, an' it was most
interestin'. I'd never seen it before. You 'eard a little dynamo like
buzzin', but the pictures were the real thing--alive an' movin'."
"I've seen 'em," said Hooper. "Of course they are taken from the very
thing itself--you see."
"Then the Western Mail came in to Paddin'ton on the big magic lantern
sheet. First we saw the platform empty an' the porters standin' by. Then
the engine come in, head on, an' the women in the front row jumped: she
headed so straight. Then the doors opened and the passengers came out and
the porters got the luggage--just like life. Only--only when any one came
down too far towards us that was watchin', they walked right out o' the
picture, so to speak. I was 'ighly interested, I can tell you. So were all
of us. I watched an old man with a rug 'oo'd dropped a book an' was tryin'
to pick it up, when quite slowly, from be'ind two porters--carryin' a
little reticule an' lookin' from side to side--comes out Mrs. Bathurst.
There was no mistakin' the walk in a hundred thousand. She come forward--
right forward--she looked out straight at us with that blindish look which
Pritch alluded to. She walked on and on till she melted out of the
picture--like--like a shadow jumpin' over a candle, an' as she went I
'eard Dawson in the ticky seats be'ind sing out: 'Christ! There's
Mrs. B.!'"
Hooper swallowed his spittle and leaned forward intently.
"Vickery touched me on the knee again. He was clickin' his four false
teeth with his jaw down like an enteric at the last kick. 'Are you sure?'
says he. 'Sure,' I says, 'didn't you 'ear Dawson give tongue? Why, it's
the woman herself.' 'I was sure before,' he says, 'but I brought you to
make sure. Will you come again with me to-morrow?'
"'Willingly,' I says, 'it's like meetin' old friends.'
"'Yes,' he says, openin' his watch, 'very like. It will be four-and-twenty
hours less four minutes before I see her again. Come and have a drink,' he
says. 'It may amuse you, but it's no sort of earthly use to me.' He went
out shaking his head an' stumblin' over people's feet as if he was drunk
already. I anticipated a swift drink an' a speedy return, because I wanted
to see the performin' elephants. Instead o' which Vickery began to
navigate the town at the rate o' knots, lookin' in at a bar every three
minutes approximate Greenwich time. I'm not a drinkin' man, though there
are those present"--he cocked his unforgetable eye at me--"who may have
seen me more or less imbued with the fragrant spirit. None the less, when
I drink I like to do it at anchor an' not at an average speed of eighteen
knots on the measured mile. There's a tank as you might say at the back o'
that big hotel up the hill--what do they call it?"
"The Molteno Reservoir," I suggested, and Hooper nodded.
"That was his limit o' drift. We walked there an' we come down through the
Gardens--there was a South-Easter blowin'--an' we finished up by the
Docks. Then we bore up the road to Salt River, and wherever there was a
pub Vickery put in sweatin'. He didn't look at what he drunk--he didn't
look at the change. He walked an' he drunk an' he perspired in rivers. I
understood why old Crocus 'ad come back in the condition 'e did, because
Vickery an' I 'ad two an' a half hours o' this gipsy manoeuvre an' when we
got back to the station there wasn't a dry atom on or in me."
"Did he say anything?" Pritchard asked.
"The sum total of 'is conversation from 7.45 P.M. till 11.15 P.M. was
'Let's have another.' Thus the mornin' an' the evenin' were the first day,
as Scripture says.... To abbreviate a lengthy narrative, I went into Cape
Town for five consecutive nights with Master Vickery, and in that time I
must 'ave logged about fifty knots over the ground an' taken in two gallon
o' all the worst spirits south the Equator. The evolution never varied.
Two shilling seats for us two; five minutes o' the pictures, an' perhaps
forty-five seconds o' Mrs. B. walking down towards us with that blindish
look in her eyes an' the reticule in her hand. Then out walk--and drink
till train time."
"What did you think?" said Hooper, his hand fingering his waistcoat
pocket.
"Several things," said Pyecroft. "To tell you the truth, I aren't quite
done thinkin' about it yet. Mad? The man was a dumb lunatic--must 'ave
been for months--years p'raps. I know somethin' o' maniacs, as every man
in the Service must. I've been shipmates with a mad skipper--an' a lunatic
Number One, but never both together I thank 'Eaven. I could give you the
names o' three captains now 'oo ought to be in an asylum, but you don't
find me interferin' with the mentally afflicted till they begin to lay
about 'em with rammers an' winch-handles. Only once I crept up a little
into the wind towards Master Vickery. 'I wonder what she's doin' in
England,' I says. 'Don't it seem to you she's lookin' for somebody?' That
was in the Gardens again, with the South-Easter blowin' as we were makin'
our desperate round. 'She's lookin' for me,' he says, stoppin' dead under
a lamp an' clickin'. When he wasn't drinkin', in which case all 'is teeth
clicked on the glass, 'e was clickin' 'is four false teeth like a Marconi
ticker. 'Yes! lookin' for me,' he said, an' he went on very softly an' as
you might say affectionately. '_But?_ he went on, 'in future, Mr.
Pyecroft, I should take it kindly of you if you'd confine your remarks to
the drinks set before you. Otherwise,' he says, 'with the best will in the
world towards you, I may find myself guilty of murder! Do you understand?'
he says. 'Perfectly,' I says, 'but would it at all soothe you to know that
in such a case the chances o' your being killed are precisely equivalent
to the chances o' me being outed.' 'Why, no,' he says, 'I'm almost afraid
that 'ud be a temptation,'
"Then I said--we was right under the lamp by that arch at the end o' the
Gardens where the trams came round--'Assumin' murder was done--or
attempted murder--I put it to you that you would still be left so badly
crippled, as one might say, that your subsequent capture by the police--to
'oom you would 'ave to explain--would be largely inevitable.' 'That's
better,' 'e says, passin' 'is hands over his forehead. 'That's much
better, because,' he says, 'do you know, as I am now, Pye, I'm not so sure
if I could explain anything much.' Those were the only particular words I
had with 'im in our walks as I remember."
"What walks!" said Hooper. "Oh my soul, what walks!"
"They were chronic," said Pyecroft gravely, "but I didn't anticipate any
danger till the Circus left. Then I anticipated that, bein' deprived of
'is stimulant, he might react on me, so to say, with a hatchet.
Consequently, after the final performance an' the ensuin' wet walk, I kep'
myself aloof from my superior officer on board in the execution of 'is
duty as you might put it. Consequently, I was interested when the sentry
informs me while I was passin' on my lawful occasions that Click had asked
to see the captain. As a general rule warrant officers don't dissipate
much of the owner's time, but Click put in an hour and more be'ind that
door. My duties kep' me within eyeshot of it. Vickery came out first, an'
'e actually nodded at me an' smiled. This knocked me out o' the boat,
because, havin' seen 'is face for five consecutive nights, I didn't
anticipate any change there more than a condenser in hell, so to speak.
The owner emerged later. His face didn't read off at all, so I fell back
on his cox, 'oo'd been eight years with him and knew him better than boat
signals. Lamson--that was the cox's name--crossed 'is bows once or twice
at low speeds an' dropped down to me visibly concerned. 'He's shipped 'is
court-martial face,' says Lamson. 'Some one's goin' to be 'ung. I've never
seen that look but once before when they chucked the gun-sights overboard
in the _Fantastic_.' Throwin' gun-sights overboard, Mr. Hooper, is the
equivalent for mutiny in these degenerate days. It's done to attract the
notice of the authorities an' the _Western Mornin' News_--generally by a
stoker. Naturally, word went round the lower deck an' we had a private
over'aul of our little consciences. But, barrin' a shirt which a second-
class stoker said 'ad walked into 'is bag from the marines flat by itself,
nothin' vital transpired. The owner went about flyin' the signal for
'attend public execution,' so to say, but there was no corpse at the
yardarm. 'E lunched on the beach an' 'e returned with 'is regulation
harbour-routine face about 3 P. M. Thus Lamson lost prestige for raising
false alarms. The only person 'oo might 'ave connected the epicycloidal
gears correctly was one Pyecroft, when he was told that Mr. Vickery would
go up country that same evening to take over certain naval ammunition left
after the war in Bloemfontein Fort. No details was ordered to accompany
Master Vickery. He was told off first person singular--as a unit---by
himself."
The marine whistled penetratingly.
"That's what I thought," said Pyecroft. "I went ashore with him in the
cutter an' 'e asked me to walk through the station. He was clickin'
audibly, but otherwise seemed happy-ish.
"'You might like to know,' he says, stoppin' just opposite the Admiral's
front gate, 'that Phyllis's Circus will be performin' at Worcester
to-morrow night. So I shall see 'er yet once again. You've been very
patient with me,' he says.
"'Look here, Vickery,' I said, 'this thing's come to be just as much as I
can stand. Consume your own smoke. I don't want to know any more.'
"'You!' he said. 'What have you got to complain of?--you've only 'ad to
watch. I'm _it_,' he says, 'but that's neither here nor there,' he says.
'I've one thing to say before shakin' 'ands. Remember,' 'e says--we were
just by the Admiral's garden-gate then--'remember, that I am _not_ a
murderer, because my lawful wife died in childbed six weeks after I came
out. That much at least I am clear of,' 'e says.
"'Then what have you done that signifies?' I said. 'What's the rest of
it?'
"'The rest,' 'e says, 'is silence,' an' he shook 'ands and went clickin'
into Simons Town station."
"Did he stop to see Mrs. Bathurst at Worcester?" I asked.
"It's not known. He reported at Bloemfontein, saw the ammunition into the
trucks, and then 'e disappeared. Went out--deserted, if you care to put it
so--within eighteen months of his pension, an' if what 'e said about 'is
wife was true he was a free man as 'e then stood. How do you read it off?"
"Poor devil!" said Hooper. "To see her that way every night! I wonder what
it was."
"I've made my 'ead ache in that direction many a long night."
"But I'll swear Mrs. B. 'ad no 'and in it," said the Sergeant unshaken.
"No. Whatever the wrong or deceit was, he did it, I'm sure o' that. I 'ad
to look at 'is face for five consecutive nights. I'm not so fond o'
navigatin' about Cape Town with a South-Easter blowin' these days. I can
hear those teeth click, so to say."
"Ah, those teeth," said Hooper, and his hand went to his waistcoat pocket
once more. "Permanent things false teeth are. You read about 'em in all
the murder trials."
"What d'you suppose the captain knew--or did?" I asked.
"I never turned my searchlight that way," Pyecroft answered unblushingly.
We all reflected together, and drummed on empty beer bottles as the
picnic-party, sunburned, wet, and sandy, passed our door singing "The
Honeysuckle and the Bee."
"Pretty girl under that kapje," said Pyecroft.
"They never circulated his description?" said Pritchard.
"I was askin' you before these gentlemen came," said Hooper to me,
"whether you knew Wankies--on the way to the Zambesi--beyond Buluwayo?"
"Would he pass there--tryin' to get to that Lake what's 'is name?" said
Pritchard.
Hooper shook his head and went on: "There's a curious bit o' line there,
you see. It runs through solid teak forest--a sort o' mahogany really--
seventy-two miles without a curve. I've had a train derailed there twenty-
three times in forty miles. I was up there a month ago relievin' a sick
inspector, you see. He told me to look out for a couple of tramps in the
teak."
"Two?" Pyecroft said. "I don't envy that other man if----"
"We get heaps of tramps up there since the war. The inspector told me I'd
find 'em at M'Bindwe siding waiting to go North. He'd given 'em some grub
and quinine, you see. I went up on a construction train. I looked out for
'em. I saw them miles ahead along the straight, waiting in the teak. One
of 'em was standin' up by the dead-end of tke siding an' the other was
squattin' down lookin' up at 'im, you see."
"What did you do for 'em?" said Pritchard.
"There wasn't much I could do, except bury 'em. There'd been a bit of a
thunderstorm in the teak, you see, and they were both stone dead and as
black as charcoal. That's what they really were, you see--charcoal. They
fell to bits when we tried to shift 'em. The man who was standin' up had
the false teeth. I saw 'em shinin' against the black. Fell to bits he did
too, like his mate squatting down an' watchin' him, both of 'em all wet in
the rain. Both burned to charcoal, you see. And--that's what made me ask
about marks just now--the false-toother was tattooed on the arms and
chest--a crown and foul anchor with M.V. above."
"I've seen that," said Pyecroft quickly. "It was so."
"But if he was all charcoal-like?" said Pritchard, shuddering.
"You know how writing shows up white on a burned letter? Well, it was like
that, you see. We buried 'em in the teak and I kept... But he was a friend
of you two gentlemen, you see."
Mr. Hooper brought his hand away from his waistcoat-pocket--empty.
Pritchard covered his face with his hands for a moment, like a child
shutting out an ugliness.
"And to think of her at Hauraki!" he murmured--"with 'er 'air-ribbon on my
beer. 'Ada,' she said to her niece... Oh, my Gawd!"...
"On a summer afternoon, when the honeysuckle blooms,
And all Nature seems at rest,
Underneath the bower, 'mid the perfume of the flower,
Sat a maiden with the one she loves the best----"
sang the picnic-party waiting for their train at Glengariff.
"Well, I don't know how you feel about it," said Pyecroft, "but 'avin'
seen 'is face for five consecutive nights on end, I'm inclined to finish
what's left of the beer an' thank Gawd he's dead!"
