The Small House at Allington
him softly, treating him as a tame chattel, now belonging to the
noble house of De Courcy, and in this way he had been initiated into
the inner domesticities of that illustrious family. The two extra
men-servants, hired to wait upon Lady Dumbello, had vanished. The
champagne had ceased to flow in a perennial stream. Lady Rosina had
come out from her solitude, and had preached at him constantly. Lady
Margaretta had given him some lessons in economy. The Honourable
John, in spite of a late quarrel, had borrowed five pounds from him.
The Honourable George had engaged to come and stay with his sister
during the next May. The earl had used a father-in-law's privilege,
and had called him a fool. Lady Alexandrina had told him more than
once, in rather a tart voice, that this must be done, and that that
must be done; and the countess had given him her orders as though
it was his duty, in the course of nature, to obey every word that
fell from her. Such had been his Christmas delights; and now, as he
returned back from the enjoyment of them, he found himself confronted
in the railway carriage with Johnny Eames!
The eyes of the two met, and Crosbie made a slight inclination of
his head. To this Eames gave no acknowledgment whatever, but looked
straight into the other's face. Crosbie immediately saw that they
were not to know each other, and was well contented that it should be
so. Among all his many troubles, the enmity of John Eames did not go
for much. He showed no appearance of being disconcerted, though our
friend had shown much. He opened his bag, and taking out a book was
soon deeply engaged in it, pursuing his studies as though the man
opposite was quite unknown to him. I will not say that his mind did
not run away from his book, for indeed there were many things of
which he found it impossible not to think; but it did not revert to
John Eames. Indeed, when the carriages reached Paddington, he had in
truth all but forgotten him; and as he stepped out of the carriage,
with his bag in his hand, was quite free from any remotest trouble on
his account.
But it had not been so with Eames himself. Every moment of the
journey had for him been crowded with thought as to what he would do
now that chance had brought his enemy within his reach. He had been
made quite wretched by the intensity of his thinking; and yet, when
the carriages stopped, he had not made up his mind. His face had been
covered with perspiration ever since Crosbie had come across him, and
his limbs had hardly been under his own command. Here had come to him
a great opportunity, and he felt so little confidence in himself that
he almost knew that he would not use it properly. Twice and thrice
he had almost flown at Crosbie's throat in the carriage, but he was
restrained by an idea that the world and the police would be against
him if he did such a thing in the presence of that old lady.
But when Crosbie turned his back upon him, and walked out, it was
absolutely necessary that he should do something. He was not going to
let the man escape, after all that he had said as to the expediency
of thrashing him. Any other disgrace would be preferable to that.
Fearing, therefore, lest his enemy should be too quick for him,
he hurried out after him, and only just gave Crosbie time to turn
round and face the carriages before he was upon him. "You confounded
scoundrel!" he screamed out. "You confounded scoundrel!" and seized
him by the throat, throwing himself upon him, and almost devouring
him by the fury of his eyes.
The crowd upon the platform was not very dense, but there were quite
enough of people to make a very respectable audience for this little
play. Crosbie, in his dismay, retreated a step or two, and his
retreat was much accelerated by the weight of Eames's attack. He
endeavoured to free his throat from his foe's grasp; but in that he
failed entirely. For the minute, however, he did manage to escape any
positive blow, owing his safety in that respect rather to Eames's
awkwardness than to his own efforts. Something about the police he
was just able to utter, and there was, as a matter of course, an
immediate call for a supply of those functionaries. In about three
minutes three policemen, assisted by six porters, had captured our
poor friend Johnny; but this had not been done quick enough for
Crosbie's purposes. The bystanders, taken by surprise, had allowed
the combatants to fall back upon Mr. Smith's book-stall, and there
Eames laid his foe prostrate among the newspapers, falling himself
into the yellow shilling-novel depot by the over fury of his own
energy; but as he fell, he contrived to lodge one blow with his fist
in Crosbie's right eye,--one telling blow; and Crosbie had, to all
intents and purposes, been thrashed.
"Con--founded scoundrel, rascal, blackguard!" shouted Johnny, with
what remnants of voice were left to him, as the police dragged him
off. "If you only knew--what he's--done." But in the meantime the
policemen held him fast.
As a matter of course the first burst of public sympathy went with
Crosbie. He had been assaulted, and the assault had come from Eames.
In the British bosom there is so firm a love of well-constituted
order, that these facts alone were sufficient to bring twenty knights
to the assistance of the three policemen and the six porters; so that
for Eames, even had he desired it, there was no possible chance of
escape. But he did not desire it. One only sorrow consumed him at
present. He had, as he felt, attacked Crosbie, but had attacked
him in vain. He had had his opportunity, and had misused it. He
was perfectly unconscious of that happy blow, and was in absolute
ignorance of the great fact that his enemy's eye was already swollen
and closed, and that in another hour it would be as black as his hat.
"He is a con--founded rascal!" ejaculated Eames, as the policemen and
porters hauled him about. "You don't know what he's done."
"No, we don't," said the senior constable; "but we know what you have
done. I say, Bushers, where's that gentleman? He'd better come along
with us."
Crosbie had been picked up from among the newspapers by another
policeman and two or three other porters, and was attended also by
the guard of the train, who knew him, and knew that he had come up
from Courcy Castle. Three or four hangers-on were standing also
around him, together with a benevolent medical man who was proposing
to him an immediate application of leeches. If he could have done
as he wished, he would have gone his way quietly, allowing Eames to
do the same. A great evil had befallen him, but he could in no way
mitigate that evil by taking the law of the man who had attacked him.
To have the thing as little talked about as possible should be his
endeavour. What though he should have Eames locked up and fined, and
scolded by a police magistrate? That would not in any degree lessen
his calamity. If he could have parried the attack, and got the better
of his foe; if he could have administered the black eye instead of
receiving it, then indeed he could have laughed the matter off at his
club, and his original crime would have been somewhat glozed over by
his success in arms. But such good fortune had not been his. He was
forced, however, on the moment to decide as to what he would do.
"We've got him here in custody, sir," said Bushers, touching his hat.
It had become known from the guard that Crosbie was somewhat of a big
man, a frequent guest at Courcy Castle, and of repute and station in
the higher regions of the Metropolitan world. "The magistrates will
be sitting at Paddington, now, sir--or will be by the time we get
there."
By this time some mighty railway authority had come upon the scene
and made himself cognizant of the facts of the row,--a stern official
who seemed to carry the weight of many engines on his brow; one at
the very sight of whom smokers would drop their cigars, and porters
close their fists against sixpences; a great man with an erect chin,
a quick step, and a well-brushed hat powerful with an elaborately
upturned brim. This was the platform-superintendent, dominant even
over the policemen.
"Step into my room, Mr. Crosbie," he said. "Stubbs, bring that man
in with you." And then, before Crosbie had been able to make up
his mind as to any other line of conduct, he found himself in the
superintendent's room, accompanied by the guard, and by the two
policemen who conducted Johnny Eames between them.
"What's all this?" said the superintendent, still keeping on his hat,
for he was aware how much of the excellence of his personal dignity
was owing to the arrangement of that article; and as he spoke he
frowned upon the culprit with his utmost severity. "Mr. Crosbie, I am
very sorry that you should have been exposed to such brutality on our
platform."
"You don't know what he has done," said Johnny. "He is the most
confounded scoundrel living. He has broken--" But then he stopped
himself. He was going to tell the superintendent that the confounded
scoundrel had broken a beautiful young lady's heart; but he bethought
himself that he would not allude more specially to Lily Dale in that
hearing.
"Do you know who he is, Mr. Crosbie?" said the superintendent.
"Oh, yes," said Crosbie, whose eye was already becoming blue. "He is
a clerk in the Income-tax Office, and his name is Eames. I believe
you had better leave him to me."
But the superintendent at once wrote down the words "Income-tax
Office--Eames," on his tablet. "We can't allow a row like that to
take place on our platform and not notice it. I shall bring it before
the directors. It's a most disgraceful affair, Mr. Eames--most
disgraceful."
But Johnny by this time had perceived that Crosbie's eye was in a
state which proved satisfactorily that his morning's work had not
been thrown away, and his spirits were rising accordingly. He did not
care two straws for the superintendent or even for the policemen, if
only the story could be made to tell well for himself hereafter. It
was his object to have thrashed Crosbie, and now, as he looked at his
enemy's face, he acknowledged that Providence had been good to him.
"That's your opinion," said Johnny.
"Yes, sir, it is," said the superintendent; "and I shall know how to
represent the matter to your superiors, young man."
"You don't know all about it," said Eames; "and I don't suppose you
ever will. I had made up my mind what I'd do the first time I saw
that scoundrel there; and now I've done it. He'd have got much worse
in the railway carriage, only there was a lady there."
"Mr. Crosbie, I really think we had better take him before the
magistrates."
To this, however, Crosbie objected. He assured the superintendent
that he would himself know how to deal with the matter--which,
however, was exactly what he did not know. Would the superintendent
allow one of the railway servants to get a cab for him, and to find
his luggage? He was very anxious to get home without being subjected
to any more of Mr. Eames's insolence.
"You haven't done with Mr. Eames's insolence yet, I can tell you. All
London shall hear of it, and shall know why. If you have any shame in
you, you shall be ashamed to show your face."
Unfortunate man! Who can say that punishment--adequate
punishment--had not overtaken him? For the present, he had to sneak
home with a black eye, with the knowledge inside him that he had been
whipped by a clerk in the Income-tax Office; and for the future--he
was bound over to marry Lady Alexandrina De Courcy!
He got himself smuggled off in a cab, without being forced to go
again upon the platform--his luggage being brought to him by two
assiduous porters. But in all this there was very little balm for his