CHAPTER THREE.
IN WHICH THE WIDOW HOLDS CONVERSE WITH A CAPTAIN, MAKES THE ACQUAINTANCEOF A YOUNG MAN, AND RECEIVES A TELEGRAPHIC SHOCK, WHICH ENDS IN ARAILWAY JOURNEY.
Mrs Captain Tipps was, as we have said, a thin old lady of anexcessively timid temperament. She was also, as we have shown,impulsively kind in disposition. Moreover, she was bird-like in aspectand action. We would not have it supposed, however, that her featureswere sharp. On the contrary, they were neat and rounded and wellformed, telling of great beauty in youth, but her little face and mouthwere of such a form that one was led irresistibly to expect to hear herchirp; she fluttered rather than walked and twittered rather thantalked. Altogether she was a charming little old lady, with a pair ofbead-like eyes as black as sloes. Happy that captain--a sea-captain, bythe way, long since dead--round whom she had fluttered in days gone bye,and happy that son Joseph round whom, when at home, she fluttered now.
But Joseph was not often at home at the time we write of. He was anhonest soul--a gentle, affectionate man with a handsome face, neatdapper little frame, something like his mother in many ways, yet notunmanly. He was too earnest, simple, unassuming, and unaffected to bethat. He was a railway clerk, and had recently been appointed toLangrye station, about fifty miles from Clatterby, which necessitatedhis leaving his mother's roof; but Mrs Tipps consoled herself with theintention of giving up her little villa and going to live at Langrye.
Poverty, after the captain's death, had seized upon the widow, and heldher tightly down during the whole of that period when Joseph and hisonly sister Netta were being educated. But Mrs Tipps did her dutybravely by them. She was a practically religious woman, and tried mostearnestly to rule her life in accordance with the blessed Word of God.She trained up her children "in the way that they should go," inthorough reliance on the promise that "they would not depart from itwhen they were old." She accepted the command, "owe no man anything butto love one another," as given to herself as well as to the world atlarge--hence she kept out of debt, and was noted for deeds of kindnesswherever she went.
But she was pinched during this period--terribly pinched--no one knewhow severely save her daughter Netta, to whom she had been in the habitof confiding all her joys and sorrows from the time that the child couldform any conception of what joy or sorrow meant. But Mrs Tipps did notweep over her sorrows, neither did she become boisterous over her joys.She was an equable, well-balanced woman in everything except the littlematter of her nervous system. Netta was a counterpart of her mother.As time went on expenses increased, and living on small means becamemore difficult, so that Mrs Tipps was compelled to contemplate leavingthe villa, poor and small though it was, and taking a cheaper residence.At this juncture a certain Captain Lee, an old friend of her latehusband--also a sea-captain, and an extremely gruff one--called upon thewidow, found out her straitened circumstances, and instantly offered herfive hundred pounds, which she politely but firmly refused.
"But madam," said the excitable captain on that memorable occasion, "Imust insist on your taking it. Excuse me, I have my own reasons,--andthey are extremely good ones,--for saying that it is my duty to give youthis sum and yours to take it. I owe it to your late husband, who morethan once laid me under obligations to him."
Mrs Tipps shook her little head and smiled.
"You are very kind, Captain Lee, to put it in that way, and I have nodoubt that my dear husband did, as you say, lay you under manyobligations because he was always kind to every one, but I cannot Iassure you--"
"Very well," interrupted the captain, wiping his bald head with hispocket-handkerchief angrily, "then the money shall go to some charity--some--some ridiculous asylum or hospital for teaching logarithms to theHottentots of the Cape, or something of that sort. I tell you, madam,"he added with increased vehemence, seeing that Mrs Tipps still shookher head, "I tell you that I _robbed_ your husband of five hundredpounds!"
"Robbed him!" exclaimed Mrs Tipps, somewhat shocked. "Oh, Captain Lee,impossible!"
"Yes I did," replied the captain, crossing his arms and nodding his headfirmly, "robbed him. I laid a bet with him to that extent and won it."
"That is not usually considered robbery, Captain Lee," said Mrs Tippswith a smile.
"But that ought to be considered robbery," replied the captain, with afrown. "Betting is a mean, shabby, contemptible way of obtaining moneyfor nothing on false pretences. The man who bets says in his heart, `Iwant my friend's money without the trouble of working for it, thereforeI'll offer to bet with him. In so doing I'll risk an equal sum of myown money. That's fair and honourable!' Is that logic?" demanded thecaptain, vehemently, "It is not! In the first place it is mean to want,not to speak of accepting, another man's money without working for it,and it is a false pretence to say that you risk your own money becauseit is _not_ your own, it is your wife's and your children's money, whoare brought to poverty, mayhap, because of your betting tendencies, andit is your baker's and butcher's money, whose bread and meat you devour(as long as they'll let you) without paying for it, because of yourbetting tendencies, and a proportion of it belongs to your church, whichyou rob, and to the poor, whom you defraud, because of your bettingtendencies; and if you say that when you win the case is altered, Ireply, yes, it is altered for the worse, because, instead of bringingall this evil down on your own head you hurl it, not angrily, notdesperately, but, worse, with fiendish _indifference_ on the head ofyour friend and his innocent family. Yes, madam, although many men donot think it so, betting _is_ a dishonourable thing, and I'm ashamed ofhaving done it. I repent, Mrs Tipps, the money burns my fingers, and I_must_ return it."
"Dear me!" exclaimed the old lady, quite unable to reply at once to sucha gush. "But Captain Lee, did you not say that it is mean to acceptmoney without working for it, and yet you want me to accept five hundredpounds without working for it?"
"Oh! monstrous sophistry," cried the perplexed man, grasping desperatelythe few hairs that remained on his polished head, "is there nodifference then between presenting or accepting a gift and betting? Arethere not circumstances also in which poverty is unavoidable and therelief of it honourable as well as delightful? not to mention thecourtesies of life, wherein giving and receiving in the right spirit andwithin reasonable limits, are expressive of good-will and conducive togeneral harmony. Besides, I do not offer a gift. I want to repay adebt; by rights I ought to add compound interest to it for twenty years,which would make it a thousand pounds. Now, _do_ accept it, MrsTipps," cried the captain, earnestly.
But Mrs Tipps remained obdurate, and the captain left her, vowing thathe would forthwith devote it as the nucleus of a fund to build acollegiate institute in Cochin-China for the purpose of teachingIcelandic to the Japanese.
Captain Lee thought better of it, however, and directed the fund to thepurchase of frequent and valuable gifts to little Joseph and his sisterNetta, who had no scruples whatever in accepting them. Afterwards, whenJoseph became a stripling, the captain, being a director in the GrandNational Trunk Railway, procured for his protege a situation on theline.
To return to our story after this long digression:--
We left Mrs Tipps in the last chapter putting on her bonnet and shawl,on philanthropic missions intent. She had just opened the door, when ahandsome, gentlemanly youth, apparently about one or two and twenty,with a very slight swagger in his gait stepped up to it and, lifting hishat said--
"Mrs Tipps, I presume? I bring you a letter from Clatterby station.Another messenger should have brought it, but I undertook the dutypartly for the purpose of introducing myself as your son's friend. I--my name is Gurwood."
"What!--Edwin Gurwood, about whom Joseph speaks so frequently, and forwhom he has been trying to obtain a situation on the railway through ourfriend Captain Lee?" exclaimed Mrs Tipps.
"Yes," replied the youth, somewhat confused by the earnestness of theold lady's gaze, "but pray read the letter--the telegram--I fear--"
He stopped, for
Mrs Tipps had torn open the envelope, and stood gazingat it with terrible anxiety depicted on her face.
"There is no cause for immediate fear, I believe," began Edwin, but MrsTipps interrupted him by slowly reading the telegram.
"From Joseph Tipps, Langrye station, to Mrs Tipps, Eden Villa,Clatterby. Dear Mother, Netta is not very well--nothing serious, Ihope--don't be alarmed--but you'd better come and nurse her. She iscomfortably put up in my lodgings."
Mrs Tipps grew deadly pale. Young Gurwood, knowing what the messagewas, having seen it taken down while lounging at the station, hadjudiciously placed himself pretty close to the widow. Observing hershudder, he placed his strong arm behind her, and adroitly sinking downon one knee received her on the other, very much after the manner inwhich, while at school, he had been wont to act the part of second topugilistic companions.
Mrs Tipps recovered almost immediately, sprang up, and hurried into thehouse, followed by Gurwood.
"You'll have time to catch the 6.30 train," he said, as Mrs Tippsfluttered to a cupboard and brought out a black bottle.
"Thank you. Yes, I'll go by that. You shall escort me to it. Pleasering the bell."
The stout elderly female--Netta's nurse--answered.
"Come here, Durby," said the widow quickly; "I want you to take thisbottle of wine to a poor sick woman. I had intended to have gonemyself, but am called away suddenly and shan't be back to-night. Youshall hear from me to-morrow. Lock up the house and stay with the womanto look after her, if need be--and now, Mr Gurwood."
They were gone beyond recall before Mrs Durby could recover herself.
"I never did see nothink like my poor missus," she muttered, "there_must_ be somethink wrong in the 'ead. But she's a good soul."
With this comforting reflection Mrs Durby proceeded to obey her"missus's" commands.
On reaching the station Mrs Tipps found that she had five minutes towait, so she thanked Gurwood for escorting her, bade him good-bye, andwas about to step into a third-class carriage when she observed CaptainLee close beside her, with his daughter Emma, who, we may remark inpassing, was a tall, dark, beautiful girl, and the bosom friend of NettaTipps.
"Oh, there is Captain Lee. How fortunate," exclaimed Mrs Tipps, "hewill take care of me. Come, Mr Gurwood, I will introduce you to himand his daughter."
She turned to Gurwood, but that youth did not hear her remark, havingbeen forced from her side by a noiseless luggage truck on India-rubberwheels. Turning, then, towards the captain she found that he and hisdaughter had hastily run to recapture a small valise which was beingborne off to the luggage van instead of going into the carriage alongwith them. At the same moment the guard intervened, and the captain andhis daughter were lost in the crowd.
But Edwin Gurwood, although he did not hear who they were, had obtaineda glance of the couple before they disappeared, and that glance, briefthough it was, had taken deadly effect! He had been shot straight tothe heart. Love at first sight and at railway speed, is but a feebleway of expressing what had occurred. Poor Edwin Gurwood, up to thismomentous day woman-proof, felt, on beholding Emma, as if the combinedpowers of locomotive force and electric telegraphy had smitten him tothe heart's core, and for one moment he stood rooted to the earth, or--to speak more appropriately--nailed to the platform. Recovering in amoment he made a dash into the crowd and spent the three remainingminutes in a wild search for the lost one!
It was a market-day, and the platform of Clatterby station was denselycrowded. Sam Natly the porter and his colleagues in office werebesieged by all sorts of persons with all sorts of questions, and itsaid much for the tempers of these harassed men, that, in the midst oftheir laborious duties, they consented to be stopped with heavy weightson their shoulders, and, while perspiration streamed down their faces,answered with perfect civility questions of the most ridiculous andunanswerable description.
"Where's my wife?" frantically cried an elderly gentleman, seizing Samby the jacket.
"I don't know, sir," replied Sam with a benignant smile.
"There she is," shouted the elderly gentleman, rushing past and nearlyoverturning Sam.
"What a bo-ar it must be to the poatas to b' wearied so by stoopidpeople," observed a tall, stout, superlative fop with sleepy eyes andlong whiskers to another fop in large-check trousers.
"Ya-as," assented the checked trousers.
"Take your seats, gentlemen," said a magnificent guard, over six feethigh, with a bushy beard.
"O-ah!" said the dandies, getting into their compartment.
Meanwhile, Edwin Gurwood had discovered Emma. He saw her enter afirst-class carriage. He saw her smile ineffably to her father. Heheard the guard cry, "Take your seats; take your seats," and knew thatshe was about to be torn from him perhaps for ever. He felt that it wasa last look, because, how could he hope in a populous city to meet withher again? Perhaps she did not even belong to that part of the countryat all, and was only passing through. He did not even know her name!What _was_ he to do? He resolved to travel with her, but it instantlyoccurred to him that he had no ticket. He made a stride or two in thedirection of the ticket office, but paused, remembering that he knew nother destination, and that therefore he could not demand a ticket for anyplace in particular.
Doors began to slam, and John Marrot's iron horse let off a littleimpatient steam. Just then the "late passenger" arrived. There isalways a late passenger at every train. On this occasion the latepassenger was a short-sighted elderly gentleman in a brown top-coat andspectacles. He was accompanied by a friend, who assisted him to pushthrough the crowd of people who had come to see their friends away, orwere loitering about for pastime. The late passenger carried a bundleof wraps; the boots of his hotel followed with his portmanteau.
"All right sir; plenty of time," observed Sam Natly, coming up andreceiving the portmanteau from boots. "Which class, sir?"
"Eh--oh--third; no, stay, second," cried the short-sighted gentleman,endeavouring vainly to open his purse to pay boots. "Here, hold mywraps, Fred."
His friend Fred chanced at that moment to have been thrust aside by afat female in frantic haste and Edwin Gurwood, occupying the exact spothe had vacated, had the bundle thrust into his hand. He retained itmechanically, in utter abstraction of mind. The bell rang, and themagnificent guard, whose very whiskers curled with an air of calmserenity, said, "Now then, take your seats; make haste." Edwin grewdesperate. Emma smiled bewitchingly to a doting female friend who hadnodded and smiled bewitchingly to Emma for the last five minutes, underthe impression that the train was just going to start, and who earnestlywished that it _would_ start, and save her from the necessity of noddingor smiling any longer.
"Am I to lose sight of her for ever?" muttered Gurwood between histeeth.
The magnificent guard sounded his whistle and held up his hand. Edwinsprang forward, pulled open the carriage door, leaped in and sat downopposite Emma Lee! The iron horse gave two sharp responsive whistles,and sent forth one mighty puff. The train moved, but not with a jerk;it is only clumsy drivers who jerk trains; sometimes pulling them up toosoon, and having to make a needless plunge forward again, or overrunningtheir stopping points and having to check abruptly, so as to cause intimorous minds the impression that an accident has happened. In factmuch more of one's comfort than is generally known depends upon one'sdriver being a good one. John Marrot was known to the regulartravellers on the line as a first-rate driver, and some of them eventook an interest in ascertaining that he was on the engine when theywere about to go on a journey. It may be truly said of John that henever "started" his engine at all. He merely as it were insinuated theidea of motion to his iron steed, and so glided softly away.
Just as the train moved, the late passenger thrust head and shouldersout of the window, waved his arms, glared abroad, and shouted, or ratherspluttered--
"My b-b-bundle!--wraps!--rug!--lost!"
A smart burly man, with acute features, stepped on the footboard of thecarria
ge, and, moving with the train, asked what sort of rug it was.
"Eh! a b-b-blue one, wi-wi--"
"With," interrupted the man, "black outside and noo straps?"
"Ye-ye-yes--yes!"
"All right, sir, you shall have it at the next station," said theacute-faced man, stepping on the platform and allowing the train topass. As the guard's van came up he leaped after the magnificent guardinto his private apartment and shut the door.
"Hallo! Davy Blunt, somethin' up?" asked the guard.
"Yes, Joe Turner, there _is_ somethin' up," replied the acute man,leaning against the brake-wheel. "You saw that tall good-lookin' fellerwi' the eyeglass and light whiskers?"
"I did. Seemed to me as if his wits had gone on wi' the last train, an'he didn't know how to overtake 'em."
"I don't know about his wits," said Blunt, "but it seems to me that he'sgone on in _this_ train with somebody else's luggage."
The guard whistled--not professionally, but orally.
"You don't say so?"
The acute man nodded, and, leaning his elbows on the window-sill, gazedat the prospect contemplatively.
In a few minutes the 6:30 p.m. train was flying across country at therate of thirty-five or forty miles an hour.