A Hero of Romance Read online

  Chapter V

  AN EVENING AT WASHINGTON VILLA

  Washington Villa appeared, from what one could see in the darkness, tobe a fairly sized house, standing in its own grounds. Considerablestabling was built apart from, but close to the house, and as the trapdashed along the little carriage-drive numerous loud-voiced dogsannounced the fact of an arrival to whomever it might concern. Theinstant the vehicle stopped, the hall door was opened, and a littlewizened, shrunken man came down the steps. Mr. Bankes threw him thereins.

  "Jump out, you boys, and tumble into the house. Welcome to WashingtonVilla." Suiting the action to the word, and before his young friendshad clearly realized the fact of their having arrived at theirdestination, he had risen from his seat, sprung to the ground, and wasstanding on the threshold of the door. The boys were not long infollowing suit.

  "Come this way!" Striding on in front of them, through a hall of noinconsiderable dimensions, he led them into a room in which a brightfire was blazing, and which was warm with light. A pretty servant girlmade a simultaneous entrance through a door on the other side of theroom. "Catch hold." Tearing rather than taking off his waterproof andhood, he flung them to the maid. "Where are my slippers?" The maidproduced a pair from the fender, where they had been placed to warm;and Mr. Bankes thrust his feet into them, flinging his boots off on tothe floor. "Tea for five, and a good tea, too, and in about less timethan it would take me to shoot a snake."

  The maid disappeared with a laugh on her face; she was apparently usedto Mr. Bankes, and to Mr. Bankes' mode of speech. Then, after havingattended to his own comfort, the host turned his attention to hisguests.

  "Well, you're a nice lot of half-drowned puppies. By right, I ought tohang you up in front of the kitchen fire to dry."

  His guests shuffled about upon their feet with not quite a gracefulair. It was true that they looked in about as miserable a condition asthey very well could do; but considering the circumstances under whichthey had travelled, it was scarcely to be wondered at. Had Mr. Bankestravelled in their place, he might have looked like a half-drownedpuppy too.

  "But a wetting will do you good, and as for mud, why, I don't care formud. I've swallowed too much of it in my time to stick at a trifle.When I was a boy, I was the dirtiest little blackguard ever seen. Now,then, is that tea ready? Come along."

  And off he strode into the hall, the boys following sheepishly in therear. Wheeler poked Bailey in the side with his elbow, and Baileypoked Griffin, and they each of them poked the other, and theygrinned. Their feelings were altogether too much for speech. What Mr.Shane and Mrs. Fletcher would think and say--but that was a matter onwhich they would not improbably be able to speak more fully later on.A more unguestlike-looking set of guests could hardly be conceived.Not only were their boots concealed beneath thick layers of mud, butthey were spattered with mud from head to foot; their hands and faceswere filthy, and their hair was in a state of untidiness betterimagined than described. They had their everyday clothes on; theirtrousers were in general too short in the leg, and their coats tooshort in the sleeves; while Griffin was radiant with a mighty patch inthe seat of his breeches of a totally different material to theoriginal cloth. It was fortunate that Mr. Bankes did not stick attrifles, or he would never have allowed his newly-discovered guests toenter his well-kept residence.

  They followed their host into a room on the other side of the hall,and the sight they saw almost took their breath away. A table ladenwith more delicacies than they remembered to have seen crowdedtogether for a considerable space of time was, especially after thefare to which they were accustomed at Mecklemburg House, a spectaclecalculated at any time to fill them with a satisfaction almostamounting to awe. But to come out of such a night to such a prospect!To come to feast from worse than famine! The revulsion of feeling wasconsiderable, and the aspect of the guests became even more sheepishthan before.

  "Sit down, and pitch in. If you're as hungry as I am, you'll eat thetable, legs and all."

  The boys needed no second invitation. In a very short space oftime host and guests alike were doing prodigies of execution. Thenimble-handed servant-maid found it as much as she could do to supplytheir wants. On the details of the feast we need not dwell. It partookof the nature of a joke to call that elaborate meal tea. By the timeit was finished the four young gentlemen had not only ceased to thinkof what Mrs. Fletcher and Mr. Shane might say, but they had altogetherforgotten the existence of Mecklemburg House Collegiate School; andeven Charlie Griffin was prepared to declare that he had thoroughlyenjoyed that nightmare journey from Mrs. Huffham's to the presentabode of bliss. The meal had been no less to the satisfaction of thehost than of his guests.

  "Done?" They signified by their eloquent looks as much as by theirspeech that they emphatically had. "Then let's go back to the otherroom." And they went.

  A peculiarity of this other room was that all the chairs in itwere arm-chairs; and in four of not the least comfortable of thesearm-chairs the boys found themselves seated at their ease. Over thefire-place, arranged in the fashion of a trophy, were a large numberof venerable-looking pipes. Taking one of these down, Mr. Bankesproceeded to fill it from a tobacco jar which stood in a corner of themantelshelf. Then he lit it, and, planting himself in the centre ofthe hearthrug, right in front of the fire, he thrust his hands intohis pockets and looked down upon his guests, a huge, black-beardedgiant, puffing at his pipe.

  "Had a good feed?"

  They signified that they had.

  "Do you know what I brought you here for?"

  The food and the warmth combined had brought them into a state ofexceeding peace, and they were inclined to sleep. Why he had broughtthem there they neither knew nor cared; they were beyond suchtrifling. They had had a good meal, the first for many days, and itbehoved them to be thankful.

  "I'll tell you. I brought you here because I want to get you, thewhole lot of you, to run away."

  His listeners opened their eyes and ears. Bailey had made someacquaintance with his host's character before, but his three friendsstared.

  "Every boy worth his salt runs away from school. I did, and it was themost sensible thing I ever did in my life."

  When Mr. Bankes thus repeated the assertion which he had made toBailey in the trap, his hearers banished sleep and began to wonder.

  "What's the use of school? What do you do there? What do you do atthat tumble-down old red-brick house on the Cobham road? Why, youwaste your time."

  This assertion, if, to a certain extent, true, as it applied to theestablishment in question, was a random shot as applied to schools ingeneral.

  "Shall I tell you what I learnt at school? I learnt to hate it, and Ihaven't forgotten that lesson to this day; no, and I shan't till I'mpacked away with a lot of dirt on top of me. My father," Mr. Bankestook his pipe out of his mouth, and pointed his remarks with it as hewent on, "died of a broken heart, and so should I have done if Ihadn't cut it short and run away."

  No man ever looked less like dying of a broken heart than Mr. Bankesdid then.

  "A life of adventure's the life for me!"

  They were the words which had thrilled through Bertie when he hadheard them in the trap; they thrilled him again as he heard them now,and they thrilled his companions too. They stared up at Mr. Bankes asthough he held them with a spell; nor would that gentleman have made abad study for a wizard.

  "A life of adventure's the life for me! Under foreign skies in distantlands, away from the twopenny-halfpenny twaddle of spelling-books andsums, seeking fortune and finding it, a man in the midst of men, not afinicking idiot among a pack of babies. Why don't you run away? Yousee me? I was at school at Nottingham; I was just turned thirteen: Iran away with ninepence-halfpenny in my pocket. I got to Londonsomehow; and from London I got abroad, somehow too; and abroad I'vepicked up fortune after fortune, thrown them all away, and picked themup again. Now I've had about enough of it, I've made another littlepile, and this little p
ile I think I'll keep, at least just yetawhile. But what a life it's been! What larks I've had, what days andnights, what months and years! Why, when I think of all I've done, andof what I might have done, rotted away my life, if it hadn't been forthat little bolt from school,--why, when I think of that, I never seea boy but I long to take him by the scruff of the neck, and sing out,'Youngster, why don't you do as I have done, cut away from school, andrun?'"

  Mr. Bankes flung back his head and laughed. But whether he waslaughing at them, or at his own words, or at his recollections of thepast, was more than they could say. They looked at each other,conscious that their host was not the least part of the afternoon'sentertainment, and somewhat at a loss as to whether he was drawing thelong bow, taking them to be younger and more verdant than they were,or whether he was seriously advancing an educational system of hisown.

  He startled them by putting a question point-blank to Bailey, onewhich he had put before.

  "Why don't you run away?"

  "I--I don't know!" stammered Bertie. Then, frankly, as the ideaoccurred to him, "Because I never thought of it."

  Mr. Bankes laughed. His constant tendency to laughter, with or withoutapparent reason, seemed to be his not least remarkable characteristic.

  "Now you have thought of it, why don't you run away?"

  Bailey turned the matter over in his mind.

  "Why should I?"

  His friends looked at each other, thinking the conversation just atrifle queer.

  "Why ever should he run away?" asked Griffin.

  "And wherever would he run to?" added Wheeler.

  Dick Ellis said nothing, but possibly he thought the more. Mr. Bankesdirected his reply directly at Bailey.

  "I'll tell you why you ought to run away; because that's the shortestcut into a world into which you will never get by any other road. I'lltell you where you ought to run to, out of this little fleabite of anisland, into the lands of golden dreams and golden possibilities, mylad; where men at night lay themselves down poor, and in the morningrise up rich."

  Mr. Bankes, warming with his theme, began to gesticulate and stampabout the room, the boys following him with all their eyes.

  "I hate your huggermuggering existence; why should a lad of partshuggermugger all his life away? When I saw you stand up to that greatlout, I said to myself, 'That lad has grit; he's just the very spit ofwhat I was when I was just his age; he's too good to be left to muddlein this old worn-out country, to waste his time with books and sumsand trash.' I said to myself, 'I'll lend him a helping hand,' and so Iwill. I'll show you the road, if I do nothing else; and if you don'tchoose to take it, it's yourself's to blame, not me.

  "When I was out in Colorado, at Denver City, there was a boy camealong, just about your age; he came along from away down East. He wasEnglish; he'd got himself stowed away, and he'd made his way to thepromised land. He took a spade one day, and he marked out a claim, andthat boy he worked it, he did, and it turned up trumps; there wasn'tany dirt to dig, because pretty nearly all that his spade turned upwas virgin silver. He sold that claim for 10,000 dollars, money down,and he went on and prospered. That boy is now a man; he owns, Idaresay, half a dozen silver mines, and he's so rich,--ah, he's sorich he doesn't know how rich he is. Now why shouldn't you have beenthat boy?"

  Mr. Bankes paused for a reply, but his listeners furnished none.Griffin was on the point of suggesting that Bailey was not that boybecause he wasn't; but he refrained, thinking that perhaps that wasnot quite the sort of answer that was wanted.

  "I knew another boy when I was going up from the coast to Kimberley,Griqualand West. Do you boys know where that is?"

  This sudden plunge into geographical examination took his guestsaback; they did not know where Griqualand West was; perhaps they hadbeen equally misty as to the whereabouts of Denver City, Colorado.

  "It's in South Africa. Ah, that's the way to learn geography, totravel about and see the places,--pitch your books into the fire!"

  "And is the other place in South Africa?" queried Griffin.

  Mr. Bankes gave him a look the like of which he had never receivedfrom Mr. Fletcher; a look of thunder, as though he would have liked topick him up, then and there, and pitch him after the books into thefire.

  "Denver City, Colorado, in South Africa?" he roared. "Why, youleather-headed noodle, where were you at school? If I were the man whotaught you, I'd flog you from here to Dublin with a cat-o'-nine-tails,rather than I'd let you expose your ignorance like that!"

  The sudden advent among them of an explosive bomb might have created alittle more astonishment than this speech, but not much. Griffin feltthat he had better abstain from questioning, and let his host run on.

  "Denver City is in the United States of America, in the land of thestars and bars, as every idiot knows! As I was saying, before thatyoung gentleman wrote himself down donkey--and he looks it, every inchof him!--as I was saying, when I was going up from the coast toKimberley, there was a boy who used to do odd jobs for me; he hadn'tsixpenny-worth of clothes upon his back! I lost sight of him; fiveyears afterwards I met him again. It was like a tale out of the_Arabian Nights_, I tell you! That ragged boy that was, when I saw himagain five years afterwards, he reckoned to cover what any half-dozenmen might have put down, and double it afterwards. And look at thelife he'd led! It's no good my talking about it here, you'd hardlybelieve me if I told you half the things he'd done. Don't you believeany of your adventure books. There aren't half the adventures crowdedinto any book which that lad had seen. Yes, a life of adventure wasthe life for him, and he'd had it, too!"

  Mr. Bankes returned to his post of vantage in front of the fire. Inhis excitement he had smoked his pipe to premature ashes; he refilledand lighted it. Then he addressed himself to Bailey, marking time ashe went on by beating the palm of his right hand against his left.

  "I say, don't let a day be wasted--days lost are not recovered; now'syour time, and now's your opportunity; don't let the week's end findyou huggermuggering in that old school. Go out into the world! learnto be a man! Try your courage! Put your powers to the test! Search forthe golden land! Let a life of adventure be the life for you! As foryou," Mr. Bankes turned with ominous suddenness towards CharlieGriffin, "I don't say that to you; what I say to you is this: writehome to your mother for a good supply of flannel petticoats, and wrapyourself up warm, and let your hair grow long, and take care of yourcomplexion. You're a beauty boy, one of the sort who didn't ought tobe trusted out after dark alone, and who's sure to have a fit if hesees the moon!"

  It is a question if this sudden change of subject made Griffin or hisfriends the more uncomfortable. Thinking that Mr. Bankes intended ajoke, and that it would be ungrateful not to laugh, Ellis attempted asnigger; but a sudden gleam from his host's eyes in his directionbrought his mirth to an untimely ending.

  "What are you laughing at?" asked Mr. Bankes. Ellis kept silence,being most unwilling to confess that he did not know. Mr. Bankesaddressed himself again to Bailey.

  "It is you I am advising to do as I did, to try a fall with the worldand to back yourself to win, not such things as those."

  Under this heading he included Bertie's three friends, with aneloquent wave of his hand in their direction.

  "It wants a boy to make a man, not a farthing sugar stick! You'll havecause to bless this evening all your life, and to bless me, too, ifyou take the tip I've given you. Don't you listen to those who talk toyou about the hardships you will meet. What's life without hardships,I should like to know; it's hardships make the man! I'm not advisingyou to wrap yourself up in cotton-wool; leave cotton-wool tomutton-headed dummies;" this with a significant glance in thedirection of Bailey's friends. "Rather I tell you this, you backyourself to fight, and fight it out, and fight to win, and win youwill! Run away to-night, to-morrow, I don't care when, so long asit's within the week. There's nothing like striking the iron whileit's hot, and set the clock a-going which will never stop until itstrikes the hour of victory won and fortune made! A lif
e ofadventure's the life for me, and it's the life for you, and the sooneryou begin it the longer it will last and the sweeter it will be."

  There was something in Mr. Bankes' tone and manner, when he chose toput it there, which, in the eyes of his present audience, at any rate,had all the effect of natural eloquence. His excitement excited them,and almost he persuaded them to believe in the reality of his goldendreams. Bailey, indeed, sat silent, spellbound. Mr. Bankes, by nomeans a bad judge of character, had not mistaken the metal of whichthe boy was made, and every stroke he struck, struck home. As was notunnatural, Mr. Bankes' eloquence had a very much more mixed effect onBailey's friends. Their host gave a sudden turn to their thoughts bytaking out his watch.

  "Eleven o'clock! whew-w-w!" This was a whistle. "They'll think you'verun away already! Ha! ha! ha! I'm not going to have you boys sleephere, so the sooner you go the better. Now then, out you go!"

  His guests sprang to their feet as he made a movement as though hewould turn them out with as much precipitation as he had lifted theminto the trap. And, indeed, the manner of their departure was not muchmore ceremonious. Before they quite knew what was happening, he hadhustled them into the hall; the hall-door was open; they were theother side of it, and Mr. Bankes, standing on the doorstep, wasordering them off his premises.

  "Now then, clear out of this! The dogs will be loose in half a second;you'd better make tracks before they take it into their heads to trytheir teeth upon your legs."

  The door was shut, and they were left standing in the night,endeavouring to realize whether their adventure of the night had beenactual fact, or whether they had only dreamed it.