II.
_Daily_ readers revelled in it. Upon three of their number it had a particular effect.
Bill Wyvern had not been at the _Daily_ office that night. Employed during the day, he had finished his work at six; after a gloomy meal had gone gloomily to bed. This man was on probation. His appointment to a permanent post depended upon his in some way distinguishing himself; and thus far, as, miserable, he reflected, he utterly had failed. The "copy" he had done for the first issue of the _Daily_ had not been used; on this day he had been sent upon an interview and had obtained from his subject a wretched dozen words. These he had taken to the news-editor; and the news-editor had treated them and him with contempt.
"But that"s all he would say," poor Bill had expostulated.
"All he would say!" the news-editor sneered. "Here, Mathers, take this stuff and make a quarter-col. interview out of it."
Thus it was in depressed mood that Bill on the following morning opened his _Daily._
The flaring "Country House Outrage" hit his eye; he read; in two minutes his mood was changed. A sensation at Paltley Hill! At Mr.
Marrapit"s! Here was his chance! Who better fitted than he to work up this story? Fortunately he knew Mr. Henry T. Bitt"s private address; had the good sense to go straight to his chief.
A cab took him to the editor"s flat in Victoria Street. Mr. Bitt was equally enthusiastic.
"Hot stuff," said Mr. Bitt. "You"ve got your chance; make a splash. Go to the office and tell Lang I"ve put you on to it. Cut away down to the scene of the outrage and stay there as our Special Commissioner till I wire you back. Serve it up hot. Make clues if you can"t find "em. Hot, mind. H-O-T."
III.
Professor Wyvern was the second reader upon whom the sensational story had particular effect.
Through breakfast the Professor eyed with loving eagerness the copy of the _Daily_ that lay folded beside his plate.
At intervals, "I have made a very good breakfast, now," he would say.
"Now I will try to find what Bill has written in this terrible paper."
But thrice Mrs. Wyvern lovingly checked him. "Dear William, no. You have hardly touched your sole. You must finish it, dear, every sc.r.a.p, before you look at the paper. You have been eating such good breakfasts lately. Now, please, William, finish it first."
"It is as big as a shark," the Professor grumbles, making shots with his trembling fork.
"Dear William, it is a very small sole."
At last he has finished. A line catches his eye as he unfolds the _Daily_, and he chuckles: "Oh, dear! This is a very horrible paper.
"Actress and Stockbroker--Piccadilly by night.""
"Dear William, we only want to read what Bill has written. An interview, he tells us, with--"
Dear William waggles his naughty old head over the actress and the stockbroker; shaky fingers unfold the centre pages; nose runs up one column and down another, then suddenly starts back burnt by the flaring "Country House Outrage."
"Dearest! Dearest! Whatever is the matter?"
But dearest is speechless. Dearest can only cough and choke and splutter in convulsions of mirth over some terrific joke of which he will tell Mrs. Wyvern no more than: "He has done it. Oh, dear! oh, dear! He has done it. Oh, dear! This will be very funny indeed!"
IV.
It will be seen that two out of the three readers particularly interested in Mr. Bitt"s splash were agreeably interested. Upon the third the effect was different.
It was George"s first morning in the little inn at Dippleford Admiral.
An unaccustomed weight upon his legs, at which thrice he sleepily kicked without ridding himself of it, at length awoke him.
He found the morning well advanced; the disturbing weight that had oppressed him he saw to be a hairy object, orange of hue. Immediately his drowsy senses awoke; took grip of events; sleep fled. This object was the Rose of Sharon, and at once George became actively astir to the surgings of yesterday, the mysteries of the future.
Pondering upon them, he was disturbed by a knock that heralded a voice: "The paper you ordered, mister; and when"ll you be ready for breakfast?"
"Twenty minutes," George replied; remembered the landlady had overnight told him she was a little deaf; on a louder note bawled: "Twenty minutes, Mrs. Pinner!"
Mrs. Pinner, after hesitation, remarked: "Ready now? Very well, mister"; pushed a newspaper beneath the door; shuffled down the stairs.
In the course of his brief negotiations with Mrs. Pinner upon the previous evening, George, in response to the proud information that the paper-boy arrived at nine o"clock every morning on a motor bicycle, had bellowed that he would have the _Daily_. For old Bill"s sake he had ordered it; with friendly curiosity to see Bill"s new a.s.sociations he now withdrew his legs from beneath the Rose of Sharon; hopped out of bed; opened the paper.
Upon "Country House Outrage" George alighted plump; with goggle eyes, scalp creeping, blood freezing, read through to the last "Catchy Clue"; aghast sank upon his bed.
It had got into the papers! Among all difficult eventualities against which he had made plans this had never found place. It had got into the papers! The cat"s abduction was, or soon would be, in the knowledge of everyone. This infernal reward which with huge joy he had heard offered, was now become the goad that would p.r.i.c.k into active search for the Rose every man, woman, or child who read the story. It had got into the papers! He was a felon now; fleeing justice; every hand against him. Discovery looked certain, and what did discovery mean? Discovery meant not only loss of the enormous stake for which he was playing--his darling Mary,--but it meant--"Good G.o.d!" groaned my miserable George, "it means ruin; it means imprisonment."
Melancholy pictures went galloping like wild nightmares through this young man"s mind. He saw himself in the dock, addressed in awful words by the judge who points out the despicable character of his crime; he saw himself in hideous garb labouring in a convict prison; he saw himself struck off the roll at the College of Surgeons; he saw himself--"Oh, Lord!" he groaned, "I"m fairly in the cart!"
Very slowly, very abject, he peeled off his pyjamas; slid a white and trembling leg into his bath.
But the preposterous buoyancy of youth! The cold water that splashed away the clamminess of bed washed, too, the more vapoury fears from George"s brain; the chilly splashings that braced his system to a tingling glow braced also his mind against the pummellings of his position. Drying, he caught himself whistling; catching himself in such an act he laughed ruefully to think how little ground he had for good spirits.
But the whistling prevailed. This ridiculous buoyancy of youth! What luckless pigs are we who moon and fret and grow besodden with the waters of our misfortunes! This cheeky corkiness of youth! Shove it under the fretted sea of trouble, and free it will twist, up it will bob. Weight it and drop it into the deepest pool; just when it should be drowned, pop! and it is again merrily bobbing upon the surface.
It is a sight to make us solemn-souled folk disgustingly irritated. We are the Marthas--trudging our daily rounds, oppressed with sense of the duties that must be done, with the righteous feeling of the hardness of our lot; and these light-hearts, these trouble-shirkers, this corkiness of youth, exasperate us enormously. But the grin is on their side.
The whistling prevailed. By the time George was dressed he had put his position into these words--these feather-brained, corky, preposterous words: "By gum!" said George, brushing his hair, "by gum! I"m in a devil of a hole!"
The decision summed up a cogitation that showed him to be in a hole indeed, but not in so fearsome a pit as he had at first imagined. He had at first supposed that within a few minutes the earth would be shovelled in on him and he buried. Review of events showed the danger not to be so acute. On arrival the previous night, after brief parley with Mrs. Pinner he had gone straight to his room, bearing the Rose tight hid in her basket. No reason, then, for suspicion yet to have fallen upon him. He must continue to keep the Rose hid. It would be difficult, infernally difficult; but so long as he could effect it he might remain here secure. The beastly cat must of course be let out for a run. That was a chief difficulty. Well, he must think out some fearful story that would give him escape with the basket every morning.
V.
Breakfast was laid in a little sitting-room over the porch, adjoining his bedroom. George pressed the poor Rose into her basket; carried it in.
Mrs. Pinner was setting flowers on the table. George carried the basket to the window; placed it on a chair; sat upon it. With his right hand he drummed upon the lid. It was his purpose to inspire the Rose with a timid wonder at this drubbing that should prevent her voicing a protest against cramped limbs.
"Some nice tea and a bit of fish I"m going to bring you up, mister,"
Mrs. Pinner told him.
Recollecting her deafness, and in fear lest she should approach the basket, George from the window bellowed: "Thank you, Mrs. Pinner. But I won"t have tea, if you please. Won"t have tea. I drink milk-- _milk_. A lot of milk. I"m a great milk-drinker."