The Missing Link - Edward Dyson (distant reading txt) 📗

familiarly. He lifted his hat pointedly to the lady. "'Ow's yerself Jinny?" he asked.

The lady and gentleman stared at him in utmost astonishment for a moment, then consternation seized them, and they made a dive for the vehicle. Nickie followed to the door.

"So long, if yer mus' be goin', Willyum," he said, pleasantly. "So long, Jinny. How's the old man's fish business?"

"Drive on!" gasped the gentleman. He had the scared expression of one who had seen a spectre.

The liveried menial whipped up, and the carriage was swept away. Nickie returned to his heap, and for fully two minutes Stub McGuire, his employer, gazed at him in speechless, open-mouthed amazement.

"Well, of all the blarsted cheeks!" gasped McGuire, when speech came to him.

"Don't mention it," said Nickie.

"Don't mention it!" yelled Stub. "No, iv course not, but what price his nibs in the noble belltopper mentionin' it t' th' Johns, an' gettin' you seven days fer disgustin' behaviour?"

Nickie smiled inscrutably, and continued his work. When the carriage returned, he made an adroit movement, and courteously opened the door.

"'Low me, Jinny, my dear," he said, offering his grimy hand.

The lady stepped down, and passed him disdainfully. The gentleman brushed him aside.

"'Ope yeh 'ad er pleasant ride in yer cart, Billy?" said Nicholas.

He followed them to the gate, and called through the bars.

"Very sorry, Jinny, but I carn't haccept yer pressin' invitation ter dinner, havin' er previous engagement."

He returned to his work again, smiling sweetly. He seemed to enjoy Stub McGuire's horror.

"'Ere, 'ere," said McGuire, "off this job you go if you don't know better than to insult people that way. You'll be gettin' me inter mischiff."

"Not at all," said Nickie, "not at all. Surely a man may offer ordinary civilities to his friends. Bless my soul, you wouldn't have me cut old Billy in the streets, would you? If I didn't speak to Jinny she'd think I was angry with her, and cry her eyes out. She has a tender heart, poor girl. She is a sensitive soul, and craves for social distinction. She looks to me to secure them a footing in exclusive circles, Mr. McGuire."

"I don't know what y're talkin' about," Stub grumbled, "but that's enough of it, see?"

Nickie took no notice of his employer's admonitions, however, and when a clergyman drove up in a buggy an hour later, our hero intercepted him at the gate.

"Good afternoon, sir," he said. "Would you mind tellin' Willyum inside there how Nickie sends him his compliments, and 'opes Jinny's quite well."

"My good fellow, you must not be insolent," ejaculated the minister.

"They won't take it as hinsolence," Nicholas explained. "They've er very touchin' regard fer me. Tell them. I arsked after 'em, won't yer?"

Even Stub McGuire noticed that Nickie, whose speech was usually excellent, adopted the vulgar tongue in addressing the man he called Billy, or any of his friends or relations.

Next day, Nickie inveigled three children, who were playing on the lawn, and entertained them at the gate with frivolous conversation for nearly ten minutes, when the state of affairs was discovered by their dignified mamma, who sent a maid flying to the rescue. Nickie took off his hat to the maid.

"Tell Willyum," he said, "that bein' 'andy, I'll drop in ter lunch t' day, but Jinny's not on no account t' put up a big spread fer me. I'll jist take what's goin'."

He finished these remarks at the top of his voice, the girl being half-way back to the house.

When the important man in immaculate black came out a little later, Nickie saluted him gravely, as between gentlemen, but without deference.

"'Ow's it, Billy?" he said. "You might drop in an' see me this evenin'. I'm livin' under th' blackberry hedge back o' your stables."

The stout man passed in silence, and with a great show of dignity. Nickie had a busy afternoon. Evidently it was the dignified lady's "day." Quite a crowd of people drove up to the gates during the afternoon, and Nickie entrusted each with an affectionate and familiar message to Jinny. All were horrified at the insolence of the disgusting man, and one young fellow kicked Mr. Crips, but our' hero did not seem to mind. He merely warned his assailant that he would issue a County Court writ for any damages done to his trousers.

On the following morning at about 11 o'clock Nickie entered the grounds, his rags fluttering in the breeze, marched to the door and rang the bell. To the Napoleonic man-servant who opened to him, he gravely presented a tomato can half-full of water, and said:

"Will yer please arsk Bill or Jinny if they'll be so good as to bile my billy at the drorin'-room fire. Tell 'em it's Nicholas Crips what makes the request. No, thanks, I won't come in, I'm afraid my motor car might bolt."

The Napoleonic man-servant threw Nickie off the verandah, and threw his billy after him, but this did not deter Nicholas from an attempt to enter into familiar conversation bearing on family matters, when he found the dignified lady in a summer house.

The lady glared at him in stony horror. "How dare you?" she ejaculated. "How dare you?"

"Why, what's wrong, Jinny, old girl." asked Crips innocently, assuming a lounging attitude in the doorway. "You find the togs I'm wearin' a trifle too negligee, so to speak. They're quite the thing in our set."

"Let me pass!" ejaculated the lady with crushing hauteur.

Nickie was not impressed. He smiled, and continued dreamily: "My word, things have moved with you, Jinny. You're gone up like er rocket in er reg'lar blaze iv glory, but I can still see yeh in the old shop days. You blazed then too, old girl. It wasn't with di'monds, 'twas fish scales, but you blazed. You could alwiz put on dog. You sold flathead, Jinny, but I give the devil his due--you did it like a duchess."

At this point the Napoleonic footman intervened again. He took Nickie by his rags and the nape of his neck, and running him tip-toe out of the garden, tumbled him headlong on the grass-grown roadside. Nickie rejoined Stub McGuire quite unconcerned.

"That's a new society game, my friend," he said. "The flunkey scored ten points."

A few hours later the proprietor of the cement mansion came to his gate, and beckoned Nicholas Crips off the heap. Nickie the Kid responded with alacrity, and Stub McGuire gazed in cow-like wonder while the two discussed matters in the gateway.

Nickie was calling him "Bill," "Billy," and "Willyum," indiscriminately. Stub nearly fainted when he saw the gentleman draw a bank-note from his pocket, and hand it to Nicholas Crips. Nickie lifted his deplorable hat, and said:

"So long, Bill. I'm sorry I can't come an' stay a month. Some other time, perhaps."

The gentleman went in, and slammed the gate behind him. Nickie returned to the heap, and picked up his coat and donned it.

"I'm handing in my resignation, Mr. McGuire," he said. "You are welcome to my earnings, as I intend to live on my means--temporary at least." He held up the note.

"A tenner!" gasped McGuire.

"A tenner!" replied Nicholas, "presented by the kind gentleman on condition that I emigrate from this suburb and absent myself permanently. The worst thing about rich relations, Stub, is that they want whole suburbs to themselves; the best is that you can make them pay for the privilege of exclusiveness."


CHAPTER III.

THE MASK BALL.

NICKIE the Kid only observed his agreements and kept honourable promises so long as some material advantage flowed from his complaisance. Within a month he was again haunting the vicinity of the white mansion. One night he leaned against the fence and watched a procession of guests alighting from their vehicles. Splendid motors dashed up, and loads of gaily-dressed ladies and gentlemen quaintly caparisoned were discharged at the great iron gates, and went trooping up the path to the flaring white residence, blazing like a crystal palace in a fairy tale.

Nickie was not exactly envious, but looking through the iron railing at the gay array of lanterns in the vast garden, and the glowing mansion, and hearing the hubbub of cheerful voices and the laughter, he had a dawning sense that respectability, especially well-to-do respectability, had its compensations after all.

He walked to the gate for a better view, and discovered a strange object lying on the path. It was a false nose, a large, red, boosy nose, with, a length of elastic to hold it in its place. One of the guests had dropped it. Nickie put it on in a waggish humour, and stood moralising as three pretty Spanish dancers, in charge of a toreador, passed in.

Nickie loved gaiety, waster and rapscallion as he was--sunshine, colour, flowers, beautiful women, life, music and laughter shook passions loose within him. Another little kink in his brain might have made a poet of him, just as the smallest turn of chance might have made a deadbeat of almost any poet of parts.

Mr. Crips actually sighed over that vision of fair women, and longed to be that happy toreador.


"Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,
Before we, too, into the dust descend:
Dust unto dust, and under dust to lie,
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and--sans End."


The quotation had just escaped our hero lips when a young fellow garbed as Romeo, alighting from a hansom, dashed into him.

"By Jove, that was dooced awkward of me--yes, I beg your pardon, I'm sure. Should have looked where I was going--what? said Romeo.

"Not at all," answered Nickie politely. "My fault in blocking the path. My fault, entirely."

"By Jo-o-ve!" gasped Romeo; "that's a stunnin' make-up, old chap--what? Nevah saw a bettah, by gad."

"Make-up?" said Nicholas. Mr. Crips had for gotten his false nose.

"Ya-as," said Romeo. "Your character, you know. A fellah 'd think you'd just come from sleeping in a rubbish bin. Yes. Best Weary Willie I've seen. But aren't you coming in, dear boy? You're a cart for Dolly's prize for best-sustained character, eh?"

"Presently--presently." said Nicholas, smitten with a sudden idea. "Waiting for a friend, you know."

Romeo went up the garden path, and Nickie the Kid retired under the shadow of the hedge to allow his thoughts to revolve. Romeo's words had suggested possibilities. Mr. Crips rarely wasted time making up his mind. Three minutes later he was sauntering jauntily up the garden path on the heels of a laughing Red Indian set.

It was a fancy dress ball. All the guests were masked or otherwise disguised. Nickie had never encountered a softer thing. He determined to make a night of it at the expense of the host of "White-cliff." To avoid unpleasantness at the door, Nickie boldly climbed up the trellis of a vine, and entered the noisy crowded ballroom through an open window, rolling head over heels among the guests.

His appearance provoked a shout of laughter. This was the proper way for a tramp to enter such a house. It was accepted as a quaint effort of humour. Weary Willie was applauded, and his appearance, when he rose to his feet, occasioned fresh merriment.

The "make-up" of Mr. Crips was certainly very effective, but with the exception of the false nose it was nothing but his ordinary