Sir John Constantine Part 12

Mr. Fett paused impressively.

"And you call me an original, sir!" he went on in accents of reproach; "me, who started in life with two half-crowns in my pocket, the conventional outfit for a career of commercial success!"

"They have carried you all the way to Falmouth!"

"The one of them carried me so far as to Coventry, sir: where, finding a fair in progress as I pa.s.sed through the town, and falling in with three bridesmaids who had missed their wedding-party in the crowd, I spent the other in treating them to the hobby-horses at one halfpenny a ride. Four halfpennies--there were four of us--make twopence, and two's into thirty are fifteen rides; a bold investment of capital, and undertaken (I will confess it) not only to solace the fair ones but to ingratiate myself with the fellow who turned the handle of the machine. To him I applied for a job. He had none to offer, but introduced me to a company of strolling players who (as fortune would have it) were on the point of presenting _Hamlet_ with a _dramatis_ personae decimated by Coventry ale. They cast me for 'Polonius' and some other odds and ends. You may remember, sir, that at one point the Prince of Denmark is instructed to 'enter reading.'

That stage direction I caught at, and by a happy 'improvisation'

spread it over the entire play. Not as 'Polonius' only, but as 'Bernardo' upon the midnight platform, as 'Osric,' as 'Fortinbras,'

as the 'Second Gravedigger,' as one of the odd Players--always I entered reading. In my great scene with the Prince we entered reading together. They killed me, still reading, behind the arras; and at a late hour I supped with the company on Irish stew; for, incensed by these novelties, the audience had raided a greengrocer's shop between the third and fourth acts and thereafter rained their criticism upon me in the form of cabbages and various esculent roots which we collected each time the curtain fell.

"Every cloud, sir, has a silver lining. I continued long enough with this company to learn that in our country an actor need never die of scurvy. But I weary you with my adventures, of which indeed I am yet in the first chapter."

"You shall rehea.r.s.e them on another occasion. But will you at least tell us how you came to Falmouth?"

"Why, in the simplest manner in the world. A fortnight since I happened to be sitting in the stocks, in the absurd but accursed town of Bovey Tracey in Devonshire. My companion--for the machine discommodated two--was a fiddler, convicted (like myself) of vagrancy; a bottle-nosed man, who took the situation with such phlegm as only experience can breed, and munched a sausage under the commonalty's gaze. 'Good Lord,' said I to myself, eyeing him, 'and to think that he with my chances, or I with his taste for music, might be driving at this moment in a coach and pair!'

"'Sir,' said I, 'are you attached to that instrument of yours?'

'So deeply,' he answered, 'that, like Nero, I could fiddle if Bovey Tracey were burning at this moment.' 'You can perform on it creditably?' I asked. 'In a fashion to bring tears to your eyes,' he answered me, and offered to prove his words. 'Not for worlds,' said I; 'but it grieves me to think how Fortune distributes her favours.'

I told him of my father. 'I should like to make the acquaintance of such a man,' said he. 'You shall,' said I; and fetching a pencil and a sc.r.a.p of paper out of my pocket, I wrote as follows:--

"_To Mr. Jonathan Fett, Manufacturer of Flams, W. Bromicheham_."

"The Public Stocks, Bovey Tracey, Devon.

June 21st (longest day)."

"DEAR FATHER, Adopt bearer, in lieu of Your affectionate son, PHINEAS."

"The fiddler at first suspected a jest: but on my repeated a.s.surances took the letter thankfully, and at parting, on our release, pressed on me the end of his sausage wrapped in a piece of newspaper.

I ate the sausage moodily and was about to throw the paper away when my eye caught sight of an advertis.e.m.e.nt in the torn left-hand corner.

I read it, and my mind was made up. I am here, and (thanks to you, sir) with a rose in my hat."

By the time Mr. Fett concluded his narrative we had reached the outskirts of the town, and found ourselves in a traffic which, converging upon the Market Strand from every side-street and alley, at once carried us along with it and constrained us to a walking pace. My father, finding the throng on the Market Strand too dense for our horses, turned aside to the Three Cups Inn across the street, gave them over to the ostler, and led us upstairs to a window which overlooked the gathering.

The Market Strand at Falmouth is an open oblong s.p.a.ce, not very wide, leading off the main street to the water's edge, and terminating in steps where as a rule the watermen wait to take off pa.s.sengers to the Packets. A lamp-post stands in the middle of it, and by the base of this the preachers--a grey-headed man and two women in ugly bonnets-- were already a.s.sembled, with but a foot or two dividing them from the crowd. Close behind the lamp-post stood a knot of men conversing together one of whom stepped forward for a word with the grey-headed preacher. He wore a rose in his hat, and at sight of him my heart gave a wild incredulous leap. It was Nat Fiennes!

I pushed past my father and flung the open window still wider.

The grey-haired preacher had opened the Bible in his hand and was climbing the stone base of the lamp-post when a handful of filth struck the back of the book and bespattered his face. I saw Nat whip out his sword and swing about angrily in the direction of the shot, while the two women laid hands on either arm to check him; and at the same moment my father spoke up sharply in my ear.

"Tumble out, lad," he commanded. "We are in bare time."

I vaulted over the window-ledge and dropped into the street; my father after me, and Mr. Fett and Billy close behind. Indeed, that first shot had but given the signal for a general engagement; and as we picked ourselves up and thrust our way into the crowd, a whole volley of filth bespattered the group of Methodists. In particular I noted the man with whom Nat Fiennes, a minute since, had been conversing--a little bald-headed fellow of about fifty-five or sixty, in a suit of black which, even at thirty paces distant, showed rusty in the sunshine. An egg had broken against his forehead, and the yellow of it trickled down over his eyes; yet he stood, hat in hand, neither yielding pace nor offering to resist. Nat, less patient, had made a rush upon the crowd, which had closed around and swallowed him from sight. By its violent swaying he was giving it something to digest. One of the two women shrank terrified by the base of the lamp-post. The other--a virago to look at, with eyes that glared from under the pent of her black bonnet--had pulled the grey-headed preacher down by his coat-tails, and, mounting in his room, clung with an arm around the lamp-post and defied the persecutors.

"Why am I here, friends?" she challenged them. "O generation of vipers, why am I here? Answer me, you men of Belial--you, whose fathers slew the prophets! Because I glory to suffer for the right; because to turn the other cheek is a Christian's duty, and as a Christian woman I'll turn it though you were twice the number, and not be afraid what man can do unto me."

Now, my father was well known in Falmouth and pretty generally held in awe. At sight of him advancing, the throng fell back and gave us pa.s.sage in a sudden lull which reached even to where Nat Fiennes struggled in the grasp of a dozen longsh.o.r.emen who were hailing him to the quay's edge, to fling him over. He broke loose, and before they could seize him again came staggering back, panting and dishevelled.

"Prosper!" he cried, catching sight of me, and grinning delightedly all over his muddied face. "I knew you would come! And your father, too? Splendid, lad, splendid?"

"Ye men of Falmouth"--the woman by the lamp-post lifted her voice more shrilly--"what shall I testify of the hardness of your hearts?

Shall I testify that your Mayor sending his crier round, has threatened to whip us through Falmouth streets at the cart-tail?

Shall I testify--"

But here my father lifted a hand. "Gently, madam; gently, I am not defending his Worship if he issued any such proclamation; but 'tis an ancient punishment for scolds, and I advise you to lend him no colour of excuse."

"And who may _you_ be, sir?" she demanded, looking down, angry, but checked in spite of herself by my father's air of authority.

"One," he answered, "who has come to see fair play, and who has--as you may see--for the moment some little influence with this rabble.

I will continue to exert it while I can, if you on your part will forbear to provoke; for the tongue, madam, has its missiles as well as the hands."

"I thank you, sir," said the grey-headed preacher, stepping forward and thrusting a book into my father's hands. "We had best begin with a hymn, I think. I have some experience of the softening power of music on these occasions."

"We will sing," announced the woman, "that beautiful hymn beginning, 'Into a world of ruffians sent.' Common metre, my friends, and Sister Tresize will give the pitch:

"Into a world of ruffians sent, I walk on hostile ground--"

My father bared his head and opened the hymn-book; the rest of us, bareheaded too, ranged ourselves beside him; and so we stood facing the mob while the verses were sung in comparative quiet. The words might be provocative, but few heard them. The tune commanded an audience, as in Cornwall a tune usually will. The true secret of the spell, however, lay in my father's presence and bearing. A British crowd does not easily attack one whom it knows as a neighbour and born superior; and it paid homage now to one who, having earned it all his life, carelessly took it for granted.

"Begad, sir," said Mr. Fett in my ear, "and the books say that the feudal system is dead in England! Why, here's the very flower of it!

Damme, though, the old gentleman is splendid; superlative, sir; it's ten to one against Coriola.n.u.s, and no takers. Between ourselves, Coriola.n.u.s was a pretty fellow, but talked too much.

Phocion, sir? Did I hear you mention Phocion?"

"You did not," I answered.

"And quite right," said he; "with your father running, I wouldn't back Phocion for a place. All the same," Mr. Fett admitted, "this is what Mr. Gray of Peterhouse, Cambridge, would call a fearful joy, and I'd be thankful for a distant prospect of the way out of it."

"Indeed, sir"--my father, overhearing this, turned to him affably-- "you touch the weak spot. For the moment I see no way out of the situation, nor any chance but to prolong it; and even this," he added, "will not be easy unless the lady on the lamp-post sensibly alters the tone of her discourse."

Indeed, at the conclusion of the singing she had started again to address the crowd, albeit--acting on my father's hint--in more moderate tones, and even, as I thought, somewhat tepidly. Her theme was what she called convictions of sin, of which by her own account she had wrestled with a surprising quant.i.ty; but in the rehearsal of them, though fluent, she seemed to lose heart as her hearers relaxed their attention.

"Confound the woman!" grumbled my father. "She had done better, after all, to continue frantic. The crowd came to be amused, and is growing restive again."

"Sir," interposed Mr. Fett, "give me leave to a.s.sure you that an audience may be amused and yet throw things. Were this the time and place for reminiscences, I could tell you a tale of Stony Stratford (appropriately so-called, sir), where, as 'Juba' in Mr. Addison's tragedy of _Cato_, for two hours I piled the Pelion of pa.s.sion upon the Ossa of elocutionary correctness, still without surmounting the zone of plant life; which in the Arts, sir, must extend higher than geographers concede. And yet I evoked laughter; from which I may conclude that my efforts amused. The great Demosthenes, sir, practised declamation with his mouth full of pebbles--for retaliatory purposes, I have sometimes thought."

Here my father, who had been paying no attention to Mr. Fett's discourse, interrupted it with a sharp but joyful exclamation; and glancing towards him I saw his face clear of anxiety.

"We are safe," he announced quietly, nodding in the direction of the Three Cups. "What we wanted was a fool, and we have found him."

CHAPTER VIII.

TRIBULATIONS OF A MAYOR

"Like the Mayor of Falmouth, who thanked G.o.d when the Town Jail was enlarged."--_Old Byword_.

His nod was levelled at a horseman who had ridden down the street and was pressing upon the outskirts of the crowd: and this was no less a dignitary than the Mayor of Falmouth, preceded on foot by a beadle and two mace-bearers, all three of them shouting "Way! Make way for the Mayor!" with such effect that in less than half a minute the crowd had divided itself to form a lane for them.