The Wrong Box, Page 4

  CHAPTER IV. The Magistrate in the Luggage Van

  The city of Winchester is famed for a cathedral, a bishop--but he wasunfortunately killed some years ago while riding--a public school, aconsiderable assortment of the military, and the deliberate passage ofthe trains of the London and South-Western line. These and manysimilar associations would have doubtless crowded on the mind of JosephFinsbury; but his spirit had at that time flitted from the railwaycompartment to a heaven of populous lecture-halls and endless oratory.His body, in the meanwhile, lay doubled on the cushions, the forage-caprakishly tilted back after the fashion of those that lie in wait fornursery-maids, the poor old face quiescent, one arm clutching to hisheart Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper.

  To him, thus unconscious, enter and exeunt again a pair of voyagers.These two had saved the train and no more. A tandem urged to its lastspeed, an act of something closely bordering on brigandage at the ticketoffice, and a spasm of running, had brought them on the platform justas the engine uttered its departing snort. There was but one carriageeasily within their reach; and they had sprung into it, and the leaderand elder already had his feet upon the floor, when he observed MrFinsbury.

  'Good God!' he cried. 'Uncle Joseph! This'll never do.'

  And he backed out, almost upsetting his companion, and once more closedthe door upon the sleeping patriarch.

  The next moment the pair had jumped into the baggage van.

  'What's the row about your Uncle Joseph?' enquired the youngertraveller, mopping his brow. 'Does he object to smoking?'

  'I don't know that there's anything the row with him,' returned theother. 'He's by no means the first comer, my Uncle Joseph, I can tellyou! Very respectable old gentleman; interested in leather; been to AsiaMinor; no family, no assets--and a tongue, my dear Wickham, sharper thana serpent's tooth.'

  'Cantankerous old party, eh?' suggested Wickham.

  'Not in the least,' cried the other; 'only a man with a solid talentfor being a bore; rather cheery I dare say, on a desert island, but ona railway journey insupportable. You should hear him on Tonti, the assthat started tontines. He's incredible on Tonti.'

  'By Jove!' cried Wickham, 'then you're one of these Finsbury tontinefellows. I hadn't a guess of that.'

  'Ah!' said the other, 'do you know that old boy in the carriage is wortha hundred thousand pounds to me? There he was asleep, and nobody therebut you! But I spared him, because I'm a Conservative in politics.'

  Mr Wickham, pleased to be in a luggage van, was flitting to and fro likea gentlemanly butterfly.

  'By Jingo!' he cried, 'here's something for you! "M. Finsbury, 16 JohnStreet, Bloomsbury, London." M. stands for Michael, you sly dog; youkeep two establishments, do you?'

  'O, that's Morris,' responded Michael from the other end of the van,where he had found a comfortable seat upon some sacks. 'He's a littlecousin of mine. I like him myself, because he's afraid of me. He'sone of the ornaments of Bloomsbury, and has a collection of somekind--birds' eggs or something that's supposed to be curious. I bet it'snothing to my clients!'

  'What a lark it would be to play billy with the labels!' chuckled MrWickham. 'By George, here's a tack-hammer! We might send all thesethings skipping about the premises like what's-his-name!'

  At this moment, the guard, surprised by the sound of voices, opened thedoor of his little cabin.

  'You had best step in here, gentlemen,' said he, when he had heard theirstory.

  'Won't you come, Wickham?' asked Michael.

  'Catch me--I want to travel in a van,' replied the youth.

  And so the door of communication was closed; and for the rest of the runMr Wickham was left alone over his diversions on the one side, and onthe other Michael and the guard were closeted together in familiar talk.

  'I can get you a compartment here, sir,' observed the official, as thetrain began to slacken speed before Bishopstoke station. 'You had bestget out at my door, and I can bring your friend.'

  Mr Wickham, whom we left (as the reader has shrewdly suspected)beginning to 'play billy' with the labels in the van, was a younggentleman of much wealth, a pleasing but sandy exterior, and a highlyvacant mind. Not many months before, he had contrived to get himselfblackmailed by the family of a Wallachian Hospodar, resident forpolitical reasons in the gay city of Paris. A common friend (to whom hehad confided his distress) recommended him to Michael; and the lawyerwas no sooner in possession of the facts than he instantly assumedthe offensive, fell on the flank of the Wallachian forces, and, in theinside of three days, had the satisfaction to behold them routed andfleeing for the Danube. It is no business of ours to follow them onthis retreat, over which the police were so obliging as to presidepaternally. Thus relieved from what he loved to refer to as theBulgarian Atrocity, Mr Wickham returned to London with the mostunbounded and embarrassing gratitude and admiration for his saviour.These sentiments were not repaid either in kind or degree; indeed,Michael was a trifle ashamed of his new client's friendship; it hadtaken many invitations to get him to Winchester and Wickham Manor; buthe had gone at last, and was now returning. It has been remarked by somejudicious thinker (possibly J. F. Smith) that Providence despises toemploy no instrument, however humble; and it is now plain to the dullestthat both Mr Wickham and the Wallachian Hospodar were liquid lead andwedges in the hand of Destiny.

  Smitten with the desire to shine in Michael's eyes and show himself aperson of original humour and resources, the young gentleman (who was amagistrate, more by token, in his native county) was no sooner alone inthe van than he fell upon the labels with all the zeal of a reformer;and, when he rejoined the lawyer at Bishopstoke, his face was flushedwith his exertions, and his cigar, which he had suffered to go out wasalmost bitten in two.

  'By George, but this has been a lark!' he cried. 'I've sent thewrong thing to everybody in England. These cousins of yours have apacking-case as big as a house. I've muddled the whole business up tothat extent, Finsbury, that if it were to get out it's my belief weshould get lynched.'

  It was useless to be serious with Mr Wickham. 'Take care,' saidMichael. 'I am getting tired of your perpetual scrapes; my reputation isbeginning to suffer.'

  'Your reputation will be all gone before you finish with me,' repliedhis companion with a grin. 'Clap it in the bill, my boy. "For total lossof reputation, six and eightpence." But,' continued Mr Wickham with moreseriousness, 'could I be bowled out of the Commission for thislittle jest? I know it's small, but I like to be a JP. Speaking as aprofessional man, do you think there's any risk?'

  'What does it matter?' responded Michael, 'they'll chuck you out sooneror later. Somehow you don't give the effect of being a good magistrate.'

  'I only wish I was a solicitor,' retorted his companion, 'instead of apoor devil of a country gentleman. Suppose we start one of those tontineaffairs ourselves; I to pay five hundred a year, and you to guarantee meagainst every misfortune except illness or marriage.'

  'It strikes me,' remarked the lawyer with a meditative laugh, as helighted a cigar, 'it strikes me that you must be a cursed nuisance inthis world of ours.'

  'Do you really think so, Finsbury?' responded the magistrate, leaningback in his cushions, delighted with the compliment. 'Yes, I supposeI am a nuisance. But, mind you, I have a stake in the country: don'tforget that, dear boy.'