I tendered Stacey-Lumpton a word of advice.
"If you are wise you will give them nothing."
"I don"t intend to."
"Oh, you don"t, don"t you? Well, that"s "andsome! Now, supposing I bash in your "at?" All at once he made a fresh discovery. "If "e ain"t smashed the blooming box!" He picked up from beside him the box which Stacey-Lumpton had kicked against. "Smashed it right in--straight, "e "as! Well, there"s a thing to do!" He thrust the box in question between Stacey-Lumpton and myself. "Look "ere there"s bloaters in that box." We did not need his word to make us conscious of that fact.
The perfume was enough. Stacey-Lumpton recognised that this was so with, on his face, an expression of speechless horror. "You"ve busted in the box and spiled the lot of "em. Who"s going to buy bruised bloaters, I"d like to know? I don"t mind my "at so much, but when it comes to bloaters--they"re my living."
An interposition from the lady whose bonnet had been "scrunched."
"Parties like him think no more of taking the bread out of the mouths of the struggling poor than if they was insecks!"
Her husband seemed to think the remark slightly uncalled for.
"That"s you, Eliza, all over. You must put your spoke in everybody"s wheel. You can"t keep quiet, can you?"
"It"s as well some of us are like that. Some of us would keep quiet till we was dead. I"m not that sort, I thank goodness."
A gentleman on the seat on the other side of the driver, leaning towards me, proffered a suggestion--his accent was distinctly nasal.
"If I vas your vriend I vould gif him a gopper or two to keep him quiet."
At last Stacey-Lumpton found his voice.
"Take that horrible thing away, man."
""Orrible thing! Wot are you calling a "orrible thing? Everythink"s a "orrible thing accord.i.n.k to you. Don"t you come trying no toffs over me, my funny bloke, or you"ll soon know."
Thereupon something happened which I had not expected, and which, I am pretty sure, Jimmy had not expected either. Stacey-Lumpton took that box of bloaters in his kid-gloved hands, and in another moment it was lying in the road. He had thrown it overboard. What immediately ensued may be described as larks. I had not antic.i.p.ated anything of that kind when I had suggested that we should ride outside. Jimmy "went for"
Stacey-Lumpton with a full-mouthed imprecation.
"He"s took my bloaters ... his eyes!!!"
The driver pulled up. "Now then! now then! what"s all this? Might I just inquire? Some of you"ll get hurt, you know."
Stacey-Lumpton rose from his seat. He turned. He lifted Jimmy off his feet. Jimmy was one of those half-grown coster lads who in London may be regarded as common objects of the sea-sh.o.r.e. His opponent was twice his size and he was an athlete, although he was a "toff." Lowering Jimmy, in spite of his frantic struggles, over the side of the omnibus, he dropped him on to the street. "Enery, who also evinced symptoms of violence, went by the same route after his friend.
Stacey-Lumpton tossed a sovereign after them.
"Provide yourselves with another box of bloaters and a new hat out of that, my men."
But Jimmy was not to be appeased. His honour had been wounded in its most tender place. Tossing his injured billyc.o.c.k into the mud, he began to tear his coat off his back.
"Come down! Meet me like a man!"
The driver played the part of peacemaker.
"Don"t be silly, my lad! The gentleman could swallow you! Pick up your sovereign. You"ll never see as much money in your life again." He started his horses. "Good-bye, my little dears. If I was you I"d have a bloater each for tea."
When, having arrived at the end of his first "bus drive, Stacey-Lumpton found himself on solid ground again, he delivered himself of a sententious observation:
"I fancy that some of the pa.s.sengers on that omnibus were beneath the rank of a baronet."
I agreed with him. I thought it possible that they were.
Not that I think much of a baronet either.