IX
THE EPISODE OF THE JAPANNED DISPATCH-BOX
"Sey," my brother-in-law said next spring, "I'm sick and tiredof London! Let's shoulder our wallets at once, and I will tosome distant land, where no man doth me know."
"Mars or Mercury?" I inquired; "for, in our own particular planet,I'm afraid you'll find it just a trifle difficult for Sir CharlesVandrift to hide his light under a bushel."
"Oh, I'll manage it," Charles answered. "What's the good of beinga millionaire, I should like to know, if you're always obliged to'behave as sich'? I shall travel incog. I'm dog-tired of beingdogged by these endless impostors."
And, indeed, we had passed through a most painful winter. ColonelClay had stopped away for some months, it is true, and for my ownpart, I will confess, since it wasn't _my_ place to pay the piper, Irather missed the wonted excitement than otherwise. But Charles hadgrown horribly and morbidly suspicious. He carried out his principleof "distrusting everybody and disbelieving everything," till lifewas a burden to him. He spotted impossible Colonel Clays under athousand disguises; he was quite convinced he had frightened hisenemy away at least a dozen times over, beneath the varying garbof a fat club waiter, a tall policeman, a washerwoman's boy, asolicitor's clerk, the Bank of England beadle, and the collectorof water-rates. He saw him as constantly, and in as changeful forms,as mediaeval saints used to see the devil. Amelia and I reallybegan to fear for the stability of that splendid intellect; weforesaw that unless the Colonel Clay nuisance could be abatedsomehow, Charles might sink by degrees to the mental level of acommon or ordinary Stock-Exchange plunger.
So, when my brother-in-law announced his intention of going awayincog. to parts unknown, on the succeeding Saturday, Amelia andI felt a flush of relief from long-continued tension. EspeciallyAmelia--who was _not_ going with him.
"For rest and quiet," he said to us at breakfast, laying down theMorning Post, "give _me_ the deck of an Atlantic liner! No letters;no telegrams. No stocks; no shares. No Times; no Saturday. I'm sickof these papers!"
"The World is too much with us," I assented cheerfully. I regretto say, nobody appreciated the point of my quotation.
Charles took infinite pains, I must admit, to ensure perfectsecrecy. He made me write and secure the best state-rooms--maindeck, amidships--under my own name, without mentioning his, inthe Etruria, for New York, on her very next voyage. He spoke ofhis destination to nobody but Amelia; and Amelia warned Cesarine,under pains and penalties, on no account to betray it to the otherservants. Further to secure his incog., Charles assumed the styleand title of Mr. Peter Porter, and booked as such in the Etruriaat Liverpool.
The day before starting, however, he went down with me to the Cityfor an interview with his brokers in Adam's Court, Old Broad Street.Finglemore, the senior partner, hastened, of course, to receive us.As we entered his private room a good-looking young man rose andlounged out. "Halloa, Finglemore," Charles said, "that's that scampof a brother of yours! I thought you had shipped him off years andyears ago to China?"
"So I did, Sir Charles," Finglemore answered, rubbing his handssomewhat nervously. "But he never went there. Being an idle youngdog, with a taste for amusement, he got for the time no furtherthan Paris. Since then, he's hung about a bit, here, there, andeverywhere, and done no particular good for himself or his family.But about three or four years ago he somehow 'struck ile': he wentto South Africa, poaching on your preserves; and now he's backagain--rich, married, and respectable. His wife, a nice littlewoman, has reformed him. Well, what can I do for you this morning?"
Charles has large interests in America, in Santa Fe and Topekas, andother big concerns; and he insisted on taking out several documentsand vouchers connected in various ways with his widespread venturesthere. He meant to go, he said, for complete rest and change, on ageneral tour of private inquiry--New York, Chicago, Colorado, themining districts. It was a millionaire's holiday. So he took allthese valuables in a black japanned dispatch-box, which he guardedlike a child with absurd precautions. He never allowed that box outof his sight one moment; and he gave me no peace as to its safetyand integrity. It was a perfect fetish. "We must be cautious," hesaid, "Sey, cautious! Especially in travelling. Recollect how thatlittle curate spirited the diamonds out of Amelia's jewel-case! Ishall not let this box out of my sight. I shall stick to it myself,if we go to the bottom."
We did _not_ go to the bottom. It is the proud boast of the CunardCompany that it has "never lost a passenger's life"; and the captainwould not consent to send the Etruria to Davy Jones's locker, merelyin order to give Charles a chance of sticking to his dispatch-boxunder trying circumstances. On the contrary, we had a delightfuland uneventful passage; and we found our fellow-passengers mostagreeable people. Charles, as Mr. Peter Porter, being freed forthe moment from his terror of Colonel Clay, would have felt reallyhappy, I believe--had it not been for the dispatch-box. He madefriends from the first hour (quite after the fearless old fashionof the days before Colonel Clay had begun to embitter life for him)with a nice American doctor and his charming wife, on their way backto Kentucky. Dr. Elihu Quackenboss--that was his characteristicallyAmerican name--had been studying medicine for a year in Vienna, andwas now returning to his native State with a brain close crammedwith all the latest bacteriological and antiseptic discoveries. Hiswife, a pretty and piquant little American, with a tip-tilted noseand the quaint sharpness of her countrywomen, amused Charles not alittle. The funny way in which she would make room for him by herside on the bench on deck, and say, with a sweet smile, "You sitright here, Mr. Porter; the sun's just elegant," delighted andflattered him. He was proud to find out that female attention wasnot always due to his wealth and title; and that plain Mr. Portercould command on his merits the same amount of blandishments as SirCharles Vandrift, the famous millionaire, on his South Africancelebrity.
During the whole of that voyage, it was Mrs. Quackenboss here, andMrs. Quackenboss there, and Mrs. Quackenboss the other place, till,for Amelia's sake, I was glad she was not on board to witness it.Long before we sighted Sandy Hook, I will admit, I was fairly sickof Charles's two-stringed harp--Mrs. Quackenboss and thedispatch-box.
Mrs. Quackenboss, it turned out, was an amateur artist, and shepainted Sir Charles, on calm days on deck, in all possibleattitudes. She seemed to find him a most attractive model.
The doctor, too, was a precious clever fellow. He knew something ofchemistry--and of most other subjects, including, as I gathered, thehuman character. For he talked to Charles about various ideas ofhis, with which he wished to "liven up folks in Kentucky a bit," onhis return, till Charles conceived the highest possible regard forhis intelligence and enterprise. "That's a go-ahead fellow, Sey!"he remarked to me one day. "Has the right sort of grit in him!Those Americans are the men. Wish I had a round hundred of them onmy works in South Africa!"
That idea seemed to grow upon him. He was immensely taken with it.He had lately dismissed one of his chief superintendents at theCloetedorp mine, and he seriously debated whether or not he shouldoffer the post to the smart Kentuckian. For my own part, I aminclined to connect this fact with his expressed determination tovisit his South African undertakings for three months yearly infuture; and I am driven to suspect he felt life at Cloetedorp wouldbe rendered much more tolerable by the agreeable society of a quaintand amusing American lady.
"If you offer it to him," I said, "remember, you must disclose yourpersonality."
"Not at all," Charles answered. "I can keep it dark for the present,till all is arranged for. I need only say I have interests in SouthAfrica."
So, one morning on deck, as we were approaching the Banks, hebroached his scheme gently to the doctor and Mrs. Quackenboss. Heremarked that he was connected with one of the biggest financialconcerns in the Southern hemisphere; and that he would pay Elihufifteen hundred a year to represent him at the diggings.
"What, dollars?" the lady said, smiling and accentuating thetip-tilted nose a little more. "Oh, Mr. Porter, it ain't goodenough!"
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"No, pounds, my dear madam," Charles responded. "Pounds sterling,you know. In United States currency, seven thousand five hundred."
"I guess Elihu would just jump at it," Mrs. Quackenboss replied,looking at him quizzically.
The doctor laughed. "You make a good bid, sir," he said, in his slowAmerican way, emphasising all the most unimportant words: "_But_ youoverlook one element. I _am_ a man of science, not a speculator. I_have_ trained myself for medical work, _at_ considerable cost, _in_the best schools of Europe, _and_ I do not propose _to_ fling awaythe results _of_ much arduous labour _by_ throwing myself outelastically _into_ a new line of work _for_ which my faculties _may_not perhaps equally adapt me."
("How thoroughly American!" I murmured, in the background.)
Charles insisted; all in vain. Mrs. Quackenboss was impressed; butthe doctor smiled always a sphinx-like smile, and reiterated hisbelief in the unfitness of mid-stream as an ideal place for swoppinghorses. The more he declined, and the better he talked, the moreeager Charles became each day to secure him. And, as if on purposeto draw him on, the doctor each day gave more and more surprisingproofs of his practical abilities. "I _am_ not a specialist," he said."I just ketch the drift, appropriate the kernel, _and_ let the restslide."
He could do anything, it really seemed, from shoeing a mule toconducting a camp-meeting; he was a capital chemist, a very soundsurgeon, a fair judge of horseflesh, a first class euchre player,and a pleasing baritone. When occasion demanded he could occupy apulpit. He had invented a cork-screw which brought him in a smallrevenue; and he was now engaged in the translation of a Polish workon the "Application of Hydrocyanic Acid to the Cure of Leprosy."
Still, we reached New York without having got any nearer our goal,as regarded Dr. Quackenboss. He came to bid us good-bye at the quay,with that sphinx-like smile still playing upon his features. Charlesclutched the dispatch-box with one hand, and Mrs. Quackenboss'slittle palm with the other.
"_Don't_ tell us," he said, "this is good-bye--for ever!" And hisvoice quite faltered.
"I guess so, Mr. Porter," the pretty American replied, with atelling glance. "What hotel do you patronise?"
"The Murray Hill," Charles responded.
"Oh my, ain't that odd?" Mrs. Quackenboss echoed. "The Murray Hill!Why, that's just where we're going too, Elihu!"
The upshot of which was that Charles persuaded them, beforereturning to Kentucky, to diverge for a few days with us to LakeGeorge and Lake Champlain, where he hoped to over-persuade therecalcitrant doctor.
To Lake George therefore we went, and stopped at the excellent hotelat the terminus of the railway. We spent a good deal of our time onthe light little steamers that ply between that point and the roadto Ticonderoga. Somehow, the mountains mirrored in the deep greenwater reminded me of Lucerne; and Lucerne reminded me of the littlecurate. For the first time since we left England a vague terrorseized me. _Could_ Elihu Quackenboss be Colonel Clay again, stilldogging our steps through the opposite continent?
I could not help mentioning my suspicion to Charles--who, strangeto say, pooh-poohed it. He had been paying great court to Mrs.Quackenboss that day, and was absurdly elated because the littleAmerican had rapped his knuckles with her fan and called him "areal silly."
Next day, however, an odd thing occurred. We strolled out together,all four of us, along the banks of the lake, among woods justcarpeted with strange, triangular flowers--trilliums, Mrs.Quackenboss called them--and lined with delicate ferns in thefirst green of springtide.
I began to grow poetical. (I wrote verses in my youth before I wentto South Africa.) We threw ourselves on the grass, near a smallmountain stream that descended among moss-clad boulders from thesteep woods above us. The Kentuckian flung himself at full lengthon the sward, just in front of Charles. He had a strange head ofhair, very thick and shaggy. I don't know why, but, of a sudden, itreminded me of the Mexican Seer, whom we had learned to remember asColonel Clay's first embodiment. At the same moment the same thoughtseemed to run through Charles's head; for, strange to say, witha quick impulse he leant forward and examined it. I saw Mrs.Quackenboss draw back in wonder. The hair looked too thick and closefor nature. It ended abruptly, I now remembered, with a sharp lineon the forehead. Could this, too, be a wig? It seemed very probable.
Even as I thought that thought, Charles appeared to form a suddenand resolute determination. With one lightning swoop he seized thedoctor's hair in his powerful hand, and tried to lift it off bodily.He had made a bad guess. Next instant the doctor uttered a loud andterrified howl of pain, while several of his hairs, root and all,came out of his scalp in Charles's hand, leaving a few drops ofblood on the skin of the head in the place they were torn from.There was no doubt at all it was not a wig, but the Kentuckian'snatural hirsute covering.
The scene that ensued I am powerless to describe. My pen is unequalto it. The doctor arose, not so much angry as astonished, white andincredulous. "What did you do that for, any way?" he asked, glaringfiercely at my brother-in-law. Charles was all abject apology. Hebegan by profusely expressing his regret, and offering to make anysuitable reparation, monetary or otherwise. Then he revealed hiswhole hand. He admitted that he was Sir Charles Vandrift, the famousmillionaire, and that he had suffered egregiously from the endlessmachinations of a certain Colonel Clay, a machiavellian rogue,who had hounded him relentlessly round the capitals of Europe. Hedescribed in graphic detail how the impostor got himself up withwigs and wax, so as to deceive even those who knew him intimately;and then he threw himself on Dr. Quackenboss's mercy, as a man whohad been cruelly taken in so often that he could not help suspectingthe best of men falsely. Mrs. Quackenboss admitted it was natural tohave suspicions--"Especially," she said, with candour, "as you'renot the first to observe the notable way Elihu's hair seems tooriginate from his forehead," and she pulled it up to show us. ButElihu himself sulked on in the dumps: his dignity was offended."_If_ you wanted to know," he said, "you might as well have asked me.Assault _and_ battery _is_ not the right way to test whether _a_citizen's hair is primitive or acquired."
"It was an impulse," Charles pleaded; "an instinctive impulse!"
"Civilised man restrains his impulses," the doctor answered. "You_have_ lived too long _in_ South Africa, Mr. Porter--I mean, SirCharles Vandrift, if that's the right way _to_ address such agentleman. You appear to _have_ imbibed the habits _and_ mannersof the Kaffirs you lived among."
For the next two days, I will really admit, Charles seemed morewretched than I could have believed it possible for him to be onsomebody else's account. He positively grovelled. The fact was,he saw he had hurt Dr. Quackenboss's feelings, and--much to mysurprise--he seemed truly grieved at it. If the doctor would haveaccepted a thousand pounds down to shake hands at once and forgetthe incident--in my opinion Charles would have gladly paid it.Indeed, he said as much in other words to the pretty American--forhe could not insult her by offering her money. Mrs. Quackenboss didher best to make it up, for she was a kindly little creature, inspite of her roguishness; but Elihu stood aloof. Charles urged himstill to go out to South Africa, increasing his bait to two thousanda year; yet the doctor was immovable. "No, no," he said; "I had halfdecided _to_ accept your offer--_till_ that unfortunate impulse; butthat settled the question. _As_ an American citizen, I decline _to_become the representative _of_ a British nobleman who takes such means_of_ investigating questions which affect the hair and happiness _of_his fellow-creatures."
I don't know whether Charles was most disappointed at missing thechance of so clever a superintendent for the mine at Cloetedorp, orelated at the novel description of himself as "a British nobleman;"which is not precisely our English idea of a colonial knighthood.
Three days later, accordingly, the Quackenbosses left the LakesideHotel. We were bound on an expedition up the lake ourselves, whenthe pretty little woman burst in with a dash to tell us they wereleaving. She was charmingly got up in the neatest and completest ofAmerican travelling-dresses. Charles held her hand affect
ionately."I'm sorry it's good-bye," he said. "I have done my best to secureyour husband."
"You couldn't have tried harder than I did," the little womananswered, and the tip-tilted nose looked quite pathetic; "for I justhate to be buried right down there in Kentucky! However, Elihu isthe sort of man a woman can neither drive nor lead; so we've got toput up with him." And she smiled upon us sweetly, and disappearedfor ever.
Charles was disconsolate all that day. Next morning he rose, andannounced his intention of setting out for the West on his tour ofinspection. He would recreate by revelling in Colorado silver lodes.
We packed our own portmanteaus, for Charles had not brought evenSimpson with him, and then we prepared to set out by the morningtrain for Saratoga.
Up till almost the last moment Charles nursed his dispatch-box.But as the "baggage-smashers" were taking down our luggage, and achambermaid was lounging officiously about in search of a tip,he laid it down for a second or two on the centre table while hecollected his other immediate impedimenta. He couldn't find hiscigarette-case, and went back to the bedroom for it. I helpedhim hunt, but it had disappeared mysteriously. That moment losthim. When we had found the cigarette-case, and returned to thesitting-room--lo, and behold! the dispatch-box was missing!Charles questioned the servants, but none of them had noticed it.He searched round the room--not a trace of it anywhere.
"Why, I laid it down here just two minutes ago!" he cried. But itwas not forthcoming.
"It'll turn up in time," I said. "Everything turns up in theend--including Mrs. Quackenboss's nose."
"Seymour," said my brother-in-law, "your hilarity is inopportune."
To say the truth, Charles was beside himself with anger. He tookthe elevator down to the "Bureau," as they call it, and complainedto the manager. The manager, a sharp-faced New Yorker, smiled ashe remarked in a nonchalant way that guests with valuables wererequired to leave them in charge of the management, in which casethey were locked up in the safe and duly returned to the depositoron leaving. Charles declared somewhat excitedly that he had beenrobbed, and demanded that nobody should be allowed to leave thehotel till the dispatch-box was discovered. The manager, quite cool,and obtrusively picking his teeth, responded that such tactics mightbe possible in an hotel of the European size, putting up a coupleof hundred guests or so; but that an American house, with over athousand visitors--many of whom came and went daily--could notundertake such a quixotic quest on behalf of a single foreigncomplainant.
That epithet, "foreign," stung Charles to the quick. No Englishmancan admit that he is anywhere a foreigner. "Do you know who I am,sir?" he asked, angrily. "I am Sir Charles Vandrift, of London--amember of the English Parliament."
"You may be the Prince of Wales," the man answered, "for all I care.You'll get the same treatment as anyone else, in America. But ifyou're Sir Charles Vandrift," he went on, examining his books, "howdoes it come you've registered as Mr. Peter Porter?"
Charles grew red with embarrassment. The difficulty deepened.
The dispatch-box, always covered with a leather case, bore on itsinner lid the name "Sir Charles Vandrift, K.C.M.G.," distinctlypainted in the orthodox white letters. This was a painfulcontretemps: he had lost his precious documents; he had given afalse name; and he had rendered the manager supremely carelesswhether or not he recovered his stolen property. Indeed, seeing hehad registered as Porter, and now "claimed" as Vandrift, the managerhinted in pretty plain language he very much doubted whether therehad ever been a dispatch-box in the matter at all, or whether, ifthere were one, it had ever contained any valuable documents.
We spent a wretched morning. Charles went round the hotel,questioning everybody as to whether they had seen his dispatch-box.Most of the visitors resented the question as a personal imputation;one fiery Virginian, indeed, wanted to settle the point then andthere with a six-shooter. Charles telegraphed to New York to preventthe shares and coupons from being negotiated; but his brokerstelegraphed back that, though they had stopped the numbers as faras possible, they did so with reluctance, as they were not aware ofSir Charles Vandrift being now in the country. Charles declared hewouldn't leave the hotel till he recovered his property; and formyself, I was inclined to suppose we would have to remain thereaccordingly for the term of our natural lives--and longer.
That night again we spent at the Lakeside Hotel. In the small hoursof the morning, as I lay awake and meditated, a thought brokeacross me. I was so excited by it that I rose and rushed into mybrother-in-law's bedroom. "Charles, Charles!" I exclaimed, "we havetaken too much for granted once more. Perhaps Elihu Quackenbosscarried off your dispatch-box!"
"You fool," Charles answered, in his most unamiable manner (heapplies that word to me with increasing frequency); "is _that_ whatyou've waked me up for? Why, the Quackenbosses left Lake Georgeon Tuesday morning, and I had the dispatch-box in my own handson Wednesday."
"We have only their word for it," I cried. "Perhaps they stoppedon--and walked off with it afterwards!"
"We will inquire to-morrow," Charles answered. "But I confess Idon't think it was worth waking me up for. I could stake my lifeon that little woman's integrity."
We _did_ inquire next morning--with this curious result: it turnedout that, though the Quackenbosses had left the Lakeside Hotel onTuesday, it was only for the neighbouring Washington House, whichthey quitted on Wednesday morning, taking the same train forSaratoga which Charles and I had intended to go by. Mrs. Quackenbosscarried a small brown paper parcel in her hands--in which, under thecircumstances, we had little difficulty in recognising Charles'sdispatch-box, loosely enveloped.
Then I knew how it was done. The chambermaid, loitering about theroom for a tip, was--Mrs. Quackenboss! It needed but an apron totransform her pretty travelling-dress into a chambermaid's costume;and in any of those huge American hotels one chambermaid more orless would pass in the crowd without fear of challenge.
"We will follow them on to Saratoga," Charles cried. "Pay the billat once, Seymour."
"Certainly," I answered. "Will you give me some money?"
Charles clapped his hand to his pockets. "All, all in thedispatch-box," he murmured.
That tied us up another day, till we could get some ready cash fromour agents in New York; for the manager, already most suspicious atthe change of name and the accusation of theft, peremptorily refusedto accept Charles's cheque, or anything else, as he phrased it,except "hard money." So we lingered on perforce at Lake George inignoble inaction.
"Of course," I observed to my brother-in-law that evening, "ElihuQuackenboss was Colonel Clay."
"I suppose so," Charles murmured resignedly. "Everybody I meet seemsto be Colonel Clay nowadays--except when I believe they _are_, inwhich case they turn out to be harmless nobodies. But who would havethought it was he after I pulled his hair out? Or after he persistedin his trick, even when I suspected him--which, he told us atSeldon, was against his first principles?"
A light dawned upon me again. But, warned by previous ebullitions,I expressed myself this time with becoming timidity. "Charles,"I suggested, "may we not here again have been the slaves of apreconception? We thought Forbes-Gaskell was Colonel Clay--forno better reason than because he wore a wig. We thought ElihuQuackenboss wasn't Colonel Clay--for no better reason than becausehe didn't wear one. But how do we know he _ever_ wears wigs? Isn't itpossible, after all, that those hints he gave us about make-up, whenhe was Medhurst the detective, were framed on purpose, so as tomislead and deceive us? And isn't it possible what he said of hismethods at the Seamew's island that day was similarly designed inorder to hoodwink us?"
"That is so obvious, Sey," my brother-in-law observed, in a mostaggrieved tone, "that I should have thought any secretary worth hissalt would have arrived at it instantly."
I abstained from remarking that Charles himself had not arrived atit even now, until I told him. I thought that to say so would serveno good purpose. So I merely went on: "Well, it seems to me likelythat when he came as Medhurst, with his hair cut
short, he wasreally wearing his own natural crop, in its simplest form and ofits native hue. By now it has had time to grow long and bushy. Whenhe was David Granton, no doubt, he clipped it to an intermediatelength, trimmed his beard and moustache, and dyed them all red, toa fine Scotch colour. As the Seer, again, he wore his hair muchthe same as Elihu's; only, to suit the character, more combed andfluffy. As the little curate, he darkened it and plastered it down.As Von Lebenstein, he shaved close, but cultivated his moustache toits utmost dimensions, and dyed it black after the Tyrolese fashion.He need never have had a wig; his own natural hair would throughouthave been sufficient, allowing for intervals."
"You're right, Sey," my brother-in-law said, growing almostfriendly. "I will do you the justice to admit that's the nearestthing we have yet struck out to an idea for tracking him."
On the Saturday morning a letter arrived which relieved us a littlefrom our momentary tension. It was from our enemy himself--but mostdifferent in tone from his previous bantering communications:--
"Saratoga, Friday.
"SIR CHARLES VANDRIFT--Herewith I return your dispatch-box,intact, with the papers untouched. As you will readily observe,it has not even been opened.
"You will ask me the reason for this strange conduct. Let me beserious for once, and tell you truthfully.
"White Heather and I (for I will stick to Mr. Wentworth'sjudicious sobriquet) came over on the Etruria with you,intending, as usual, to make something out of you. We followedyou to Lake George--for I had 'forced a card,' after myhabitual plan, by inducing you to invite us, with the fixedintention of playing a particular trick upon you. It formed nopart of our original game to steal your dispatch-box; that Iconsider a simple and elementary trick unworthy the skill of apractised operator. We persisted in the preparations for ourcoup, till you pulled my hair out. Then, to my great surprise,I saw you exhibited a degree of regret and genuine compunctionwith which, till that moment, I could never have credited you.You thought you had hurt my feelings; and you behaved morelike a gentleman than I had previously known you to do. Younot only apologised, but you also endeavoured voluntarily tomake reparation. That produced an effect upon me. You may notbelieve it, but I desisted accordingly from the trick I hadprepared for you.
"I might also have accepted your offer to go to South Africa,where I could soon have cleared out, having embezzled thousands.But, then, I should have been in a position of trust andresponsibility--and I am not _quite_ rogue enough to rob youunder those conditions.
"Whatever else I am, however, I am not a hypocrite. I donot pretend to be anything more than a common swindler. IfI return you your papers intact, it is only on the sameprinciple as that of the Australian bushranger, who made alady _a present_ of her own watch because she had sung to himand reminded him of England. In other words, he did not takeit from her. In like manner, when I found you had behaved, foronce, like a gentleman, contrary to my expectation, I declinedto go on with the trick I then meditated. Which does not meanto say I may not hereafter play you some other. _That_ willdepend upon your future good behaviour.
"Why, then, did I get White Heather to purloin your dispatch-box,with intent to return it? Out of pure lightness of heart? Notso; but in order to let you see I really meant it. If I hadgone off with no swag, and then written you this letter, youwould not have believed me. You would have thought it wasmerely another of my failures. But when I have actually gotall your papers into my hands, and give them up again of myown free will, you must see that I mean it.
"I will end, as I began, seriously. My trade has not quitecrushed out of me all germs or relics of better feeling; andwhen I see a millionaire behave like a man, I feel ashamedto take advantage of that gleam of manliness.
"Yours, with a tinge of penitence, but still a rogue, CUTHBERT CLAY."
The first thing Charles did on receiving this strange communicationwas to bolt downstairs and inquire for the dispatch-box. It hadjust arrived by Eagle Express Company. Charles rushed up to ourrooms again, opened it feverishly, and counted his documents. Whenhe found them all safe, he turned to me with a hard smile. "Thisletter," he said, with quivering lips, "I consider still moreinsulting than all his previous ones."
But, for myself, I really thought there was a ring of truth aboutit. Colonel Clay was a rogue, no doubt--a most unblushing rogue;but even a rogue, I believe, has his better moments.
And the phrase about the "position of trust and responsibility"touched Charles to the quick, I suppose, in re the Slump inCloetedorp Golcondas. Though, to be sure, it was a hit at me aswell, over the ten per cent commission.