Round the Block Part 34

Tiffles coughed twice for the idiot to stop, and was sagaciously obeyed.

"In behalf of Africa," he remarked, "representing her, as I may say, on this occasion, I would beg leave to apologize to the learned gentleman for the poverty of her scenery, at this stage of the panorama. If Africa had been aware of the learned gentleman's preferences, she would, doubtless, have got up some stunning effects for him in places where now you see only a river, a sky, and a strip of green bank, all unadorned, precisely as they are."

The exquisite irony of this retort pleased the audience, and elicited general though faint applause, and several cries of "Shut up, Skim!"

"Got your match, old boy!" "Oh! let the man go on!" The last remark issued from the gentlemanly conductor, and fell with peculiar pleasure on Tiffles's ears.

"One word more, and I am done," resumed the lawyer, who was professionally calm amid scenes of disturbance. "I only wish to elicit the truth. Have you, and your artist (Mr. Chicory, I think you call him), or either of you, actually gone over the scenery here represented.

We wish to understand that point!"

"We have, both of us, gone over this scenery repeatedly." This was true, as both Tiffles and Patching, antic.i.p.ating some such question, had stepped over the canvas back and forth, in rolling and unrolling it, several times. "Is the eminent counsellor satisfied?"

"Oh! yes," said C. Skimmerhorn, Esq., in a voice which signified that he knew the panorama was a humbug, but, unfortunately, couldn't prove it.

One cough, and the panorama started again--but a little too fast.

Tiffles stamped once, and the idiot reduced the speed, until it was too slow. Two stamps brought it right. The river soon disappeared in a swamp, where the alligators' heads protruding above the water gave Tiffles an opportunity to describe several terrific combats which he had enjoyed with those pugnacious creatures. This entertained the audience for several minutes.

"Have you no full views of alligators, sir?" asked a voice which Tiffles presumed, from its solemn inflection, to come from a clergyman.

"None at all, sir. The African alligator persists in keeping out of sight. You never see anything but his head--except his tail, as represented here." Tiffles pointed with his wand to something that looked like the end of a fence rail sticking out of the water. "True Art, sir, sacrifices effect for Truth."

"Certainly, sir. Truth is what we are all after," replied the clergyman.

But there was an indefinable something in his voice that indicated a wish for more alligator--much more.

The swamp ended in a dry jungle, interspersed with palm trees, elephants, lions, tigers, and serpents. Tiffles counted upon interesting his audience here. Snakes were first on the list. Two heads, with expanded jaws and forked tongues, were looking at each other above the jungle, and two tails were interlocked, also above the jungle, a few feet off. This conveyed the idea of two boa constrictors fighting. Other heads and other tails--there was always a tail for every head--stuck up at regular intervals about. He stopped the panorama with a cough, and said:

"The entire population of this particular jungle are--boa constrictors of unprecedented size and ferocity."

Tiffles heard a rustle of fans and dresses not far off. It was the whole female seminary shuddering. There was also a general movement throughout the audience as of people adjusting themselves to obtain a good sight.

"These boa constrictors, so admirably delineated here,"--commenced Tiffles.

"Where?" said the voice of a country gentleman. "I don't see any bore constructors."

"Nor I." "Nor I." "Trot 'em out!" "Show 'em up!" "Produce your snakes!"

Such were the remarks that resounded through the hall.

"Oh, no!" "Don't!" "Please don't!" emanated from several girlish voices.

"My fair auditors have no cause for alarm. I have no living snakes to show. I might have captured several hundred, and brought them to this country and exhibited them, but, in deference to the well-known aversion cherished toward snakes by cultivated communities, I forbore to do so.

The only boa constrictors that I have, are now before you. These are their heads. These their tails" (indicating the termini of the snakes).

Now, the spectators--or a large number of them--had suffered fearful expectations of seeing real snakes. When, therefore, it was announced that these harmless daubs, resembling, at a distance, some variety of tropical vegetation, were the only snakes they were to see, there was a feeling, first, of relief, and then of disappointment.

The disappointment manifested itself in low hisses, and exclamations, such as "Humbug!" "Gammon!" "Swindle!" Tiffles made several beginnings of excellent snake stories, of which he was the hero, but was checked by the tumult. Finding the snakes were not popular, he determined to try the tigers, lions, and other beasts of prey farther on. He coughed once emphatically, and the canvas moved like clockwork.

Before it had journeyed five feet, somebody on the front row of seats coughed twice in precisely the same manner as Tiffles. The idiot, supposing the signal came from his employer, stopped. Tiffles, perceiving the mistake, coughed again, and the motion was resumed; when a double cough resounded from the front seat, and the motion ceased.

Then Tiffles realized that his system of signals was understood by somebody. What should he do? He could not stop the free, universal right to cough. Therefore he stepped to the corner of the curtain, raised it, and said, in a voice loud enough to be heard by the audience, "Stoop, whenever I want you to 'stop,' or 'go on,' or 'faster,' or 'slower,' I will say so. You understand?"

"Puffickly," replied the gifted idiot.

"I say, boys, Stoop's in there," shouted the somebody that had coughed.

"Stoop!" "Stoop!" "Bully for Stoop!" "Come out o' that, Stoop!" was shouted all over the house; but Stoop remained faithful to his post, and calmly ground away at the crank.

Suddenly it occurred to some boy to yell, "Boo! boo!" whereat the other boys laughed, and took up the chorus, "Boo! boo!"

The canvas moved less steadily, slackening for a moment, and then shooting ahead, as if the propelling power were the subject of strange perturbation. The roguish boys, and the men too, and, chief of them, that practical humorist of a conductor, observing this, screamed, "Boo!

boo! boo I boo!" all the louder. Tiffles knew that the critical time had come, and philosophically laughed at the ruin of his last grand project, as he had laughed at the ruin of forty other grand projects in their day.

The panorama stopped without a signal this time. A hoa.r.s.e voice screamed, "Gorryfus! Gosh thunder! By jimminy!" The curtain was jerked aside, and Stoop rushed into the hall like a fury. Coming out of a place partly lighted into one totally dark, his first move was to run blindly into Tiffles, nearly knocking that gentleman off his legs.

"Hold on, Stoop! Hold on!" shouted Tiffles, with what was left of his breath. But the idiot only screamed, "Gosh thunder! Gorryfus!" and darted for the main aisle, intending to run a muck among his persecutors. There was a general scrambling of the boys to avoid this incarnated wrath. The whole female seminary, and all the ladies present, screamed together.

CHAPTER VII.

SCENES NOT IN THE BILLS.

The enraged idiot struck out right and left, without hurting anybody--the objects of his vengeance contriving to elude him in the dark. Most of the st.u.r.dy blows which he dealt, using his arms like flails, fell upon the railings of the seats, and only bruised his hands.

Just as he had caught a boy by the collar, and was about to take a twist in his hair, the door opened, and a light appeared. It came from three candles borne by three men.

This apparition caused the furious idiot to suspend hostilities on the instant.

All eyes were turned toward the three men. All voices were hushed. There was a whisper in the air that something strange was about to happen.

The man who entered first was a stranger, who moved and looked about in the quick, nervous way born of city life. The other two men were well-known residents of the village. Some of the audience had had unpleasant cause to know them.

Having locked the door, and stationed his a.s.sociates in a position to command the windows, the stranger walked quickly up the aisle, bearing his lighted candle, and said, in a loud voice, which fell strangely on the hushed a.s.semblage:

"Marcus Wilkeson will be kind enough to give himself up. Upon my honor, he cannot escape." This was said with a charming politeness.

A tall figure arose at the wall end of one of the back seats. "I am Marcus Wilkeson. What do you want with me, sir?" His voice trembled, and his face was livid.

"To go with me to New York, Mr. Wilkeson," said the tall stranger, quickly. "Thank you for your promptness in answering. The only clue that I had, was the hasty measure I took of you this morning, when I was watching for an escaped convict at Cortlandt-street ferry. Perhaps you remember seeing me there, sir?"

Marcus, though the sudden shock had almost stunned him, at once recalled the man who had eyed him narrowly at the ferry that morning.

The two other candle bearers had stepped forward as Marcus declared himself, and were about to lay hold of him, when the first man smilingly pushed them back, and said:

"Don't touch him. It's all right. Mr. Wilkeson is a gentleman, and will go quietly."

To Marcus he said, apologetically:

"Two Jersey constables I got to a.s.sist me. They don't do things exactly in the style of Detective Leffingwell."

Marcus recognized the name; and so terrified was he at the thoughts which it conjured up, that his tongue clove to the roof of his mouth.

The scene was like a horrid dream.