Talbot Baines Reed

“ One by one the passengers dispersed, some to besiege the railway-stations, some to invade the trams, others to walk in cheery parties by the frosty roads; all to go home.
Even the weary shopmen and shop-girls, released from the day’s labours, hurried past him homeward, and the sleepy cabman whipped up his horse for his last fare before going home, and the tramps and beggars vanished down their alleys, and sought every man his home.
Home! The word had no meaning to-night for Reginald as he watched the streets empty, and found himself a solitary wayfarer in the deserted thoroughfares. ”

“ Behind, like a dream, were the joyous, merry days spent at Garden Vale and Wilderham, with no care for the future, and no want for the present. Before them, still more like a dream, lay the prospect of their new work, with all its anxiety, and drudgery, and weariness, and the miserable eighteen shillings a week it promised them; and, equally wretched at the present moment, there was the vision of their desolate mother, alone in the Dull Street lodgings, where they had just left her, unable at the last to hide the misery with which she saw her two boys start out into the pitiless world. ”

“ Messrs Medlock and Shanklin greeted this announcement with a laugh of genuine amusement.
“I’m glad you told us,” said Mr Shanklin. “We should have forgotten to take a ticket for you.”
“You may grin,” said Durfy. “I’m going, for all that.”
“You’re a bigger fool even than you look,” said Mr Medlock, “to think so. You can consider yourself lucky to get a supper out of us this last night.”
“You forget I can make it precious awkward for you if I like,” growled Durfy.
“Awkward! You’ve a right to be a judge of what’s awkward after the neat way you’ve managed things,” sneered Shanklin. ”

“ Already Love was curled up and asleep on the bed next to that where the other lodger lay; and Reginald, stifling every feeling but his weariness, flung himself by his side and soon forgot both place and surroundings in a heavy sleep.
Heavy but fitful. He had scarcely lain an hour when he found himself suddenly wide awake. Love still lay breathing heavily beside him. The other lodger turned restlessly from side to side, muttering to himself, and sometimes moaning like a person in pain. It must have been these latter sounds which awoke Reginald. ”

“ Horace expressed himself equal to this enormous task, and set to work busily with his scissors.
If he had had no one but himself to consider he would have felt comparatively happy. He found himself in a department of work which he liked, and which, though at first not very exciting, promised some day to become interesting. His chief was a gentleman not likely to interfere with him as long as he did his work steadily, and his companions were not only friendly but entertaining. If only Reginald could have a seat at this table too, Horace felt he could face the future cheerily. ”

“ Mrs Cruden laughed.
“Never mind about the jug and basin,” said she, “as long as they hold water; and as for the look-out—well, as long as I can see my two boys’ faces happy, that’s the best view I covet.”
“You never think about yourself,” said Reginald, sadly.
“I say, mother,” said Horace, “suppose we call up the spirits from the vasty deep and ask them to get tea ready.” ”

“ Reginald smiled.
“I work for my living,” said he, keeping his eye steadily fixed on Mr Pillans, as if waiting to catch the first sign of an insult on his part.
“That’s what we all do, more or less,” said Mr Shanklin. “Blandford here works like a nigger to spend his money, don’t you, old man?”
“I do so,” said Blandford, “with your valuable assistance.”
“And with somebody else’s assistance too,” said Mr Pillans, with a shrug in the direction of Reginald. ”

“ Mr Pilch laughed quietly.
“About as much chance of his pulling through that as of jumping over the moon. The kindest thing you can do is to let him die as soon as he can. He may last a day or two. If you want to feed him, give him anything he will take, and that won’t be much, you’ll find. It’s a bad case, young fellow, and it won’t do you any good to stop too near him. No use my coming again. Good-night.”
And the brusque but not unkindly little quack trotted away, leaving Reginald in the dark without a gleam of hope to comfort him. ”

“ It is strange how often our fortunes and misfortunes, which we are so apt to suppose depend on our own successes or failures, turn out to have fallen into hands we least expected, and to have been depending on trains of circumstances utterly beyond our range of imagination.
Who, for instance, would have guessed that a meeting of half a dozen business men in a first-floor room of a New York office could have any bearing on the fate of the Cruden family? Or that an accident to Major Lambert’s horse while clearing a fence at one of the —shire hunts should also affect their prospects in life? ”

“ I’ve done with that, and I am strong enough now to stand beside the boys who have stood so bravely by their mother.”
“We’d be a nice pair of boys if we didn’t, eh, Reg?” said Horace.
Reginald’s reply was a pressure of his mother’s hand, and with a rainbow of smiles over their sorrowful hearts the three walked on lovingly together; the mother with many a brave, cheery word striving to lift her sons above their trouble, not only to hope of earthly comfort, but to trust in that great Father of the fatherless, beside whom all the love of this world is poor and fleeting. ”

“ He disliked Mr Durfy, and therefore he flared up if Mr Durfy so much as looked at him. He liked young Gedge, and therefore it was impossible to leave the youngster to his fate and let him ruin himself without an effort at rescue.
It is one thing to snatch a heedless one from under the hoofs of a cab-horse and another to pick him up from the slippery path of vice and set him firmly on his feet. Reginald had thought nothing of the one, but he looked forward with considerable trepidation to meeting the boy next morning and attempting the other. ”

“ Why don’t you go about your own work?”
“I’ve been waiting here ten-minutes for you.”
“Look here,” said Mr Durfy, his tones getting lower as his passion rose; “if you think we’re going to keep you here to give us any of your impudence you’re mistaken; so I can tell you. It’s bad enough to have a big fool put into the place for charity, without any of your nonsense. If I had my way I’d give you your beggarly eighteen shillings a week to keep you away. Go to your work.”
Reginald’s eyes blazed out for a moment on the speaker in a way which made Horace, who heard and saw all, tremble. ”

“ Whatever it is, Booms’s doleful face relaxes presently into a solemn smile, and Miss Crisp goes over and sits by Mrs Cruden, who puts her arm round the blushing girl and kisses her in a very motherly way on the forehead. It is a curious piece of business altogether, and it is just as well the four young men are too engrossed in football and cricket to notice it, and that Gedge and Waterford find their whole attention occupied by the contents of the little bookcase in the corner to have eyes for anything else. ”

“ Reginald gave a scared glance at the chairs being arranged back to back in a long line down the room, and said,—
“May I play the piano instead? and then you can join in the game.”
“What! do you play the piano?” exclaimed the young lady, forgetting her dignity and clapping her hands. “Oh, my eye, what a novelty! Ma, Mr Reginald’s going to play for musical chairs! Sam, do you hear? Mr Cruden plays the piano! Isn’t it fun?”
Reginald flung himself with a sigh down on the cracked music-stool. Music was his one passion, and the last few months had been bitter to him for want of it. ”

“ Any one almost could have endured them better than Reginald. He began a letter to Horace, but he tore it up when half-written. He drew up a statement of his own defence, but when fact after fact appeared in array on the paper it seemed more like an indictment than a defence, and he tore it up too.
At length the weary suspense was over, and once more he found himself in the outer air, stepping with almost familiar tread across the pavement into the van, and taking his place among the waiters in the dim lobby at the foot of the police-court stairs. ”

“ A flush of pleasure rose to Reginald’s cheeks, such as would have moved to pity any heart less cold-blooded than Mr Medlock’s.
“No one has called, I suppose?”
“No, sir. There’s been a letter, though, from the Rev. T. Mulberry, of Woolford-in-the-Meadow, to ask why the suit he ordered has not yet been delivered.”
Mr Medlock smiled.
“These good men are so impatient,” said he; “they imagine their order is the only one we have to think of. What would they think of the four hundred and odd suits we have on order, eh, Mr Reginald?” ”

“ She always takes on if any one mentions that boy’s name; and she’s old enough to be his aunt, too!”
“The sooner she cures herself of that craze the better,” said Sam, pouring himself out some more tea. “She don’t know quite so much about him as I do!”
“Why, what do you know about ’im, then?” inquired Mrs Shuckleford, in tones of curiosity.
“Never you mind; we don’t talk business out of the office. All I can tell you is, he’s a bad lot.”
“Poor Mrs Cruden! no wonder she takes on. What an infliction a wicked son is to a mother, Sam!” ”

“ It was Mr Barber’s turn to stare. He had not expected this, and he did not like it, especially when one or two of the men and boys near, who had failed to be convulsed by his wit, laughed at Horace’s question.
After all, moral flagellation does not always answer, and when one of the victims yawns and the other asks a matter-of-fact questions it is disconcerting even to an accomplished operator. However, Barber gallantly determined on one more effort. ”

“ Mrs Shuckleford only, as day passed day, and the prodigal never returned, shook her head and said to herself, it was a blessing no one knew the reason, not even the poor delirious sufferer herself. Poor people! they had trouble enough on them not to need any more just now! so she kept her own counsel, even from Jemima.
This was the more easy to do because she knew nothing either of Reginald or his doings beyond what her son had hinted, and as Samuel was at present in the country on business, she had no opportunity of prosecuting her inquiries on the subject. ”

“ When Reginald announced that he had written and accepted the invitation to Liverpool, there was no jubilation, no eager congratulation.
“What shall we do without you?” said Mrs Cruden.
“It is horrid having to go, mother,” said the boy; “but we must make the best of it. If you look so unhappy, I shall be sorry I ever thought of it.”
His mother tried to smile, and said,—
“Yes, we must try and make the best of it, dear boys; and if we cannot seem as glad as we should like to be, it’s not to be wondered at at first, is it?”
“I hope you’ll get holidays enough now and then to run up,” said Horace. ”

“ He had not spirit or resolution enough to wait to see Gedge or any one that evening, but slunk away, hating the sight of everybody, and wishing only he could lose himself and forget that such a wretch as Reginald Cruden existed.
Ah! Reginald. It’s a long race to escape from oneself. Men have tried it before now with better reason than you, and failed. Wait till you have something worse to run from, my honest, foolish friend. Face round like a man, and stand up to your pursuer. ”

“ Let me hope that will be a warning to you not to meddle in future with fraud, if you wish to pass as an honest man. If you touch pitch, sir, you must expect to be denied. Return to paths of honesty, young man, and seek to recover the character you have forfeited, and bear in mind the warning you have had, if you wish to avoid a more serious stain in the future. The case is dismissed.”
With which elegant peroration the magistrate, much relieved in his own mind, took up his newspaper, and Reginald was hurried once more down those steep stairs a free man. ”

“ Alas for the sensitive natures whom injustice can crush and make cowards of! You are not sensitive, thank God, and you do not know what crushing is. Pray that you never may; but till you have felt it deal leniently with poor Reginald, as he goes recklessly out into the winter gloom without a friend—not even himself. ”

“ Grievously crestfallen, Samuel withdrew, bemoaning the hour when he first heard the name of Cruden, and was fool enough to dirty his hands with a “big job.” What else was he to expect when once these official snobs took a thing up? Of course they would put every obstacle and humiliation in the way of an outsider that jealousy could suggest. He had very little doubt that this sub-inspector, the moment his back was turned, would sit down and make notes of his information, and then take all the credit of it to himself. ”

“ What was the use of trying to be better than others when the result was an infamy which, had he been a little more greedy or a little less upright, he might have avoided?
What was the use of conscious innocence and unstained honour, when they could not save him from a sense of shame of which no convicted felon could know the bitterness?
It would go out to all the world that Reginald Cruden, the suspected swindler, had been “let off” for lack of evidence after three days’ imprisonment. ”

“ The wary Horace had not played football for three seasons for nothing. He quietly ducked, allowing his unscientific assailant to overbalance himself, and topple head first on the lobby outside, at the particular moment when the real owner of the racehorse and the real wine-merchant, who had just arrived, reached the top of the stairs.
“Hullo, young fellow!” said the sporting gentleman; “practising croppers, are you? or getting up an appetite? or what? High old times you’re having up here among you! Who’s the kid?”
“Stop him!” gasped Pillans, picking himself up; “don’t let him go! ”

“ How are you, too, Mr Shanklin, pretty well?”
“Pretty fair,” said Mr Shanklin. “Come and have a drink, Durfy. You look all in the blues. Gone in love, I suppose, eh? or been speculating on the Stock Exchange? You shouldn’t, you know, a respectable man like you.”
“He looks as if he’d been speculating in mud,” said Mr Medlock, pointing to the unfortunate overseer’s collar and hat, which still bore traces of his recent calamity. “Never mind; we’ll wash it off in the Bodega. Come along.”
Durfy felt rather shy at first in his grand company, especially with the consciousness of his muddy collar. ”

“ As soon as supper was over Reginald suggested a precipitate retreat into the streets, for fear of another neighbourly incursion. Mrs Cruden laughingly yielded, and the trio had a long walk, heedless where they went, so long as they were together. They wandered as far as Oxford Street, looking into what shops were open, and interested still more in the ever-changing stream of people who even at ten o’clock at night crowded the pavements. They met no one they knew, not even Booms. ”

“ What are you talking about?” said Reginald, in blank amazement.
“Oh, I’ve give him a wonner,” said the boy, beaming. “He says to me, ‘Collar all the letters your gov’nor writes ’ome,’ he says, ‘and I’ll give you a tanner for every one you shows me.’”
“Love, you’re talking rubbish!” said Reginald indignantly.
“Are I? don’t you make no mistake,” said the boy confidently; “I knows what he says; and that there letter you wrote home last night and leaves on the table, ‘That’s a tanner to me,’ says I to myself when I sees it this morning. ‘A lie,’ says I, recollecting of that chap in the story-book. ”

“ It’s just as well, perhaps, he’s not the eldest son, Reg.”
“Well,” said Reginald laughing, “I can hardly fancy Horace the head of the family.”
“Must be a rum sensation,” said Harker, “to be an heir and not have to bother your head about how you’ll get your bread and butter some day. How many hundred millions of pounds is it you’ll come in for, Reg? I forget.”
“What a humbug you are!” said Reginald; “my father’s no better off than a lot of other people.”
“That’s a mild way of putting it, anyhow,” said Blandford. ”

“ But for Reginald that walk, faint and footsore as he was, was a pleasure-trip compared with the night’s wanderings.
Towards afternoon Love had the rare good fortune to see a gentleman drop a purse on the pavement. There was no chance of appropriating it, had he been so minded, which, to do him justice, he was not, for the purse fell in a most public manner in the sight of several onlookers. But Love was the first to reach it and hand it back to its owner. ”

“ Oh, Cruden,” ejaculated his depressed friend.
“Why, what’s wrong?” said Horace. “Don’t you think she’s nice?”
“She is; but Shuckleford, Cruden, is not.”
“Hullo, you two,” said the voice of the gentleman in question at this moment; “you seem jolly thick. Oh, of course, shopmates; I forgot; both in the news line. Eh? Now, who’s for musical chairs? Don’t all speak at once.”
“I shall have to play the piano now, Mr Reginald,” said Miss Jemima, making a last effort to get a word out of her silent companion. “I’m afraid you’re not enjoying yourself a bit.” ”

“ The other policeman was waiting outside, and between his two custodians he walked, sick at heart, and faltering in courage, longing only to get out of the reach of the curious, critical eyes that turned on him from every side, and beyond the sound of that pitiful whimper of the faithful little friend as it followed him step by step to the very door of the police-station.
At the station Mr Sniff awaited the party with a pleasant smile of welcome.
“That’s right,” said he to Reginald, encouragingly; “much better to come quietly, looks better. ”

“ Once or twice Reginald moistened his parched mouth with water, but as the evening wore on the boy became so much worse that he felt, at all hazards, he must seek help.
“I must bring a doctor to see him,” said he to the landlady; “he’s so ill.”
“You’ll bring no doctor—unless you want to see the boy chucked out in the road!” said she. “The idea! just when my lodgers will be coming home to bed too!”
“It’s only eight o’clock; no one will come till ten. There’ll be plenty of time.”
“What’s the use? You know as well as I do the child won’t last above a day or two in his state. ”

“ Oh, never mind, if it’s secrets! Nice it is, Mrs Cruden, to see young people such good friends so soon. We must be going now, children,” she added. “We shall soon see our friends in our own ’ouse, I ’ope.”
A tender leave-taking ensued. For a while, as the retreating footsteps of the visitors gradually died away on the stairs, the little family stood motionless, as though the slightest sound might recall them. But when at last the street-door slammed below, Reginald flung himself into a chair and groaned.
“Mother, we can’t stay here. We must leave to-morrow!”
Horace could not help laughing. ”

“ The trial of Medlock and Shanklin took place in due time, and among the witnesses the most important, but the most reluctant, was Reginald Cruden. It was like a hateful return to the old life to find himself face to face with those men, and to have to tell over again the story of their knavery and his own folly. But he went through with it like a man. ”

“ Am also in a position to introduce the young gentlemen to a business opening, which, if not at first important, may seem to you a favourable opportunity. On these points I shall have the honour of waiting on you during to-morrow afternoon, and meanwhile beg to remain,—
“Your obedient servant,—
“R. Richmond.”
“We ought to make sure what the investment is,” said Reginald, after hearing the letter read, “before we hand over all our money to him.”
“To be sure, dear,” said Mrs Cruden, who hated the sound of the word investment.
“I wonder what he proposes for us?” said Horace. ”

“ You must excuse these questions, Mr Cruden,” added the gentleman, with an amiable smile; “it is necessary to ask them or I would spare you the trouble.”
“He did die in debt,” said Reginald, “but we were able to pay off every penny he owed.”
“And left nothing for yourself when it was done? Very honourable, my lad; it will always be a satisfaction to you.”
“It is, sir,” said Reginald, cheering up.
“You naturally would be glad to improve your income. How much do you get where you are?”
“Eighteen shillings a week.”
Mr Medlock whistled softly. ”