"Sort o" boosted you up the tree from behind, so as when they"d all gone you could come down and pick up wot was left of "im. That it?"
enquired Bindle.
"That is exactly what happened, my friend," replied the man with the sandy beard.
"An" where did all this "appen?" asked Bindle.
"It took place in Hyde Park," replied the man. "A very rough meeting, an extremely rough meeting, and he was speaking so well, so convincingly," he added.
Bindle looked at the man curiously to see if he were really serious; but there was no vestige of a smile upon his face.
"It"s wonderful wot a man can do with a crowd," remarked Bindle oracularly; "but," turning to the inert figure of Mr. Gupperduck, "it"s still more wonderful wot a crowd can do with a man."
"Bindle!" Mrs. Bindle"s voice rang out authoritatively.
""Ere am I," replied Bindle obediently.
"Help us lift Mr. Gupperduck on a chair."
With elaborate care they raised the inert form of Mr. Gupperduck on to a chair. His arms fell down limply beside him. Once he opened his eyes, and looked round the room, then, sighing as if in thankfulness at being amongst friends, he closed them again.
""The Lord hath given me rest from mine enemies,"" he quoted.
Mrs. Bindle and the two friends regarded Mr. Gupperduck admiringly.
Seeing that their friend and brother was now in safe hands, Mr.
Gupperduck"s two supporters prepared to withdraw. Mrs. Bindle pressed them to have something to eat; but this they refused.
"Now ain"t women funny," muttered Bindle, as Mrs. Bindle left the room to show her visitors to the door. "She was jest complaining that she could only get two candles and a quarter of a pound of marjarine, and yet she wants them two coves to stay to supper, "ungry-lookin" pair they was too. I s"pose it"s wot she calls "ospitality," he added; "seems to me d.a.m.n silly."
Like a hen fussing over a damaged chick, Mrs. Bindle ministered to the requirements of Mr. Gupperduck. She fed him with a spoon, crooned over and sympathised with him in his misfortune, whilst in her heart there was a great anger against those who had raised their hands against so G.o.dly a man.
When he had eventually been half-led, half-carried upstairs by Bindle, and Bindle himself had returned to the kitchen, Mrs. Bindle expressed her unambiguous opinion of a country that permitted such an outrage.
She likened Mr. Gupperduck to those in the Scriptures who had been stoned by the mult.i.tude. She indicated that in the next world there would be a terrible retribution upon those who were responsible for the a.s.sault upon Mr. Gupperduck. She attacked the Coalition Government for not providing a more effective police force.
"But," protested Bindle at length, ""e was askin" for it. Why can"t "e keep "is opinions to "imself, and not go a-shovin" "em down other people"s throats when they don"t like the taste of "em? If you go tryin" to shove tripe down the throat of a cove wot don"t like tripe, you"re sure to get one in the eye, that is if "e"s bigger"n wot you are; if "e"s smaller "e"ll jest be sick. Yet "ere are you a-complainin" because Guppy gets "imself "urt. I don"t understand----"
"Because you haven"t got a soul," interrupted Mrs. Bindle with conviction.
"Well," remarked Bindle philosophically, "I"d sooner "ave a flea than a soul, there is flea-powder but there ain"t no soul-powder wot I"ve been able to find."
And Bindle rose, yawned and made towards the door.
CHAPTER VII
THE COURTING OF THE REV. ANDREW MACFIE
Mr. Hearty had never reconciled himself to the understanding that existed between his daughter Millie and Charlie Dixon. He resented Bindle"s share in the romance, still more he resented the spirit of independence that it had developed in Millie. He had, however, been forced to bow to the storm. Everyone was against him, and Millie herself had left home, refusing to return until he had apologised to her for the most unseemly suggestion he had made as to her relations with Charlie Dixon.
Sergeant Charles Dixon, of the 110th Service Battalion, London Regiment, had gone to the front, and Millie, sad-eyed, but grave, looked forward to the time when he would return, a V.C.
"Well, Millikins!" Bindle would cry, ""ow"s "is Nibs?" and Millie would blush and tell of the latest news she had received from her lover.
"Uncle Joe," she would say, "I couldn"t stand it but for you," and there would be that in her voice which would cause Bindle to turn his head aside and admonish himself as "an ole fool."
"It"s all right, Millikins," Bindle would say, "Charlie"s goin" to win the war, an" we"re all goin" to be proud of "im," and Millie would smile at her uncle with moist eyes, and give that affectionate squeeze to his arm that Bindle would not have parted with for the rubies of Ind.
"You know, Uncle Joe," she said bravely on one occasion, "we women have to give up those we love."
Bindle had not seen the plaintive humour of her remark; but had suddenly become noisily engrossed in the use of his handkerchief.
Mr. Hearty was almost cordial to Charlie Dixon on the eve of his going to France. Once this young man could be removed from Millie"s path, the way would be clear for a match such as he had in mind. He did not know exactly what sort of man he desired for his daughter; but he was very definite as to the position in the world that his future son-in-law must occupy. He would have preferred someone who had made his mark. Men of more mature years, he had noticed, were frequently favourably disposed towards young girls as wives, and Mr. Hearty was determined that he would be proud of his son-in-law, that is to say, his son-in-law was to be a man of whom anyone might feel proud.
It would not behove a Christian such as Mr. Hearty to wish a fellow-being dead; but he could not disguise from himself the fact that our casualties on the Western Front were heavy, particularly during the period of offensives. Since the occasion when Millie had a.s.serted her independence, and had declined to order her affections in accordance with Mr. Hearty"s wishes, there had been something of an armed neutrality existing between father and daughter. In this she had been supported, not only by Bindle and Mrs. Hearty, but, by a strange freak of fate, to a certain extent, by Mrs. Bindle herself.
Mr. Hearty had never quite understood how it was that his sister-in-law had turned against him. She had said nothing whatever as to where her sympathies lay; but Mr. Hearty instinctively felt that she had ranged herself on the side of the enemy.
But the fates were playing for Mr. Hearty.
When the Rev. Mr. Sopley, of the Alton Road Chapel, had decided to retire on account of failing health, Lady k.n.o.b-Kerrick determined to bring up from Barton Bridge, her country residence, the Rev. Andrew MacFie. She had forgiven him his partic.i.p.ation in the Temperance Fete fiasco, accepting his explanation that he had been drugged by the disciples of the devil, a view that would have been entirely endorsed by Mrs. Bindle, had she known that Bindle was responsible for the mixing of alcohol with the lemonade.
The Barton Bridge Temperance Fete fiasco had proved the greatest sensation that the county had ever known. The mixing of crude alcohol and distilled mead with the lemonade, whereby the partic.i.p.ants in the rustic fete had been intoxicated, thus causing it to develop into a wild orgy of violence, resulting in a.s.saults upon Lady k.n.o.b-Kerrick and the police, had been a nine days" wonder. A number of arrests had been made; but when the true facts came to the knowledge of the police, the prisoners had been quietly released, and officially nothing more was heard of the affair.
It was a long time before Lady k.n.o.b-Kerrick could be persuaded to see in the Rev. Andrew MacFie, the minister of her chapel, an innocent victim of a deep-laid plot. It was he who had seized the hose that washed her out of her carriage, it was he who had led the a.s.sault on the police, it was he who had said things that had been the common talk of all the public-house bars for miles round.
After Mr. MacFie"s eloquent sermon upon the Gadarene swine, Lady k.n.o.b-Kerrick had eventually come round, and a peace had been patched up between them. From that day it required more courage to whisper the words "Temperance Fete" in Barton Bridge, than to charge across "No Man"s Land" in France.
And so it was that the Rev. Andrew MacFie transferred his activities from Barton Bridge to Fulham. He was grateful to Providence for this sign of beneficent approval of his labours, and relieved to know that Barton Bridge would in the future be but a memory. There he had made history, for in the bars of The Two-Faced Earl and The Blue Fox the unbeliever drinks with gusto and a wink of superior knowledge a beverage known as a "lemon-and-a-mac," a compound of lemonade and gin, which owes its origin to the part played in the historic temperance fete by the Rev. Andrew MacFie.
One evening, shortly after the departure of Charlie Dixon, Mrs. Bindle was busily engaged in laying the table for supper. Mrs. Bindle"s kitchen was a model of what a kitchen should be. Everything was clean, orderly, neat. The utensils over the mantelpiece shone like miniature moons, the oil-cloth was spotless, the dresser scrubbed to a whiteness almost incredible in London, the saucepans almost as clean outside as in, the rug before the stove neatly pinned down at the corners. It was obviously the kitchen of a woman to whom cleanliness and order were fetiches. As Bindle had once remarked, "There"s only one spot in my missis" kitchen, and that"s when I"m there."
As she proceeded with her work she hummed her favourite hymn; it rose and fell, sometimes dying away altogether. She banged the various articles on the table as if to emphasise her thoughts. Her task completed, she went to the sink. As she was washing her hands there was a knock at the kitchen door. Taking no notice she proceeded to dry her hands. The knock was repeated.
"Oh, don"t stand there playing the fool, Bindle!" she snapped. "I haven"t time to----"
The door opened slowly and admitted the tall, lanky form of the Rev.
Andrew MacFie.
"It"s me, Mrs. Beendle," he said, as he entered the room. "The outer door was open, so I joost cam in."
"Oh! I"m sorry, sir," said Mrs. Bindle, "I thought it was Bindle."
Her whole manner underwent a change; her uncompromising att.i.tude of disapproval giving place to one of almost servile anxiety to make a good impression. She hurriedly removed and folded her ap.r.o.n, slipping it into the dresser-drawer.
"Won"t you come into the parlour, sir?" she said. "It"s very kind of you to call."