Two Sides of the Face Part 16

"I thought I had been moderately expeditious," said I.

"Yes, yes--perhaps so." He consulted his watch. "But with an affair of this sort hanging over one, the minutes drag. And yet, Heaven knows, mine may be few enough."

"Pardon me," I said, "but to what sort of affair are you alluding?"

"An affair of honour," he answered tragically.

"Eh?" I said. "A duel! You have engaged yourself to fight a duel?"

He nodded. "Then I will have nothing to do with it," I announced with decision.

"Aye," said he with marked irony, "it is at such a pinch that one discovers his true friends! But fortunately I had no sooner dispatched Gumbo in search of you than I foresaw some chance of this pusillanimity of which you give me proof."

"Pusillanimity?" I interjected. "It is nothing of the kind. But you seem to forget my position here as honorary physician to the Hotwells."

"We'll call it lukewarmness, then," he went on in yet more biting tones. "At the risk of seeming intrusive, I at once knocked up two Irish gentlemen on the landing above who had been audibly making a night of it while I sat here endeavouring to compose my thoughts to the calmness proper for framing a testamentary disposition.

Although perfect strangers to me, they cheerfully granted what you have denied me; consented with alacrity--nay, with enthusiasm--to act as my seconds in this affair; and started to carry my cartel--which, having gone to bed in their boots, they were able to do with the smallest possible delay."

"You have not yet told me the nature of the quarrel," I suggested.

His face at once resumed its wonted colour--nay, took on an extra tinge inclining to purple. "And I don't intend to!" he snapped.

"Then you no longer need my services?"

"Fortunately no, since you make such a pother of granting them.

Stay--you might witness my will here, to which I am about to affix my signature."

"With pleasure," said I. "But who is to be the other witness?

The law requires two, you know."

"Confound it--so it does! I had forgotten. We might ring up the Boots, eh?"

"Better avoid dragging the servants of the hotel into this business, especially if you would keep your intention secret. How about Gumbo?"

"He's black, to begin with, and moreover he benefits under the doc.u.ment to the extent of a small legacy."

"That rules him out, at any rate. Ha!" I exclaimed, glancing out of window, "the very man!"

"Who?"

"An excellent fellow at this moment crossing the gardens towards the Mall--he is early this morning; a discreet, solid citizen, and able to keep his counsel as well as any man in the Hotwells; our leading jeweller, Mr. Jenkinson."

I turned sharply, for the Major had sunk into his chair with a groan.

"Jenkinson!" he gasped. "Jenkinson! The man's insatiable--he has been watching the hotel in his l.u.s.t for blood! He threatened last night to cut my liver out and give it to the crows--my unfortunate liver on which you, doctor, have wasted so much solicitude. He used the most extraordinary language--not," the Major added, gripping the arms of his chair and sitting erect, "not that he shall find me slow in answering his threats."

"My dear Major," I cried, "under what delusion are you labouring?

Mr. Jenkinson, believe me, is incapable of hurting a fly. You must have mistaken your man. Come and see him for yourself." And drawing him to the window, I pointed after the figure of the retreating jeweller.

The Major's brow cleared. "No," he admitted, "that is not in the least like him. Still, he gave me his name as Jenkinson.

Oh! decidedly that is not the man."

"The name is not uncommon," said I. "Excuse me, I must hurry, or he will be out of sight!" And I ran downstairs and out into the street as Mr. Jenkinson disappeared around the corner. Following briskly, I brought him into sight again a moment before he turned aside into a small tavern--'The Lamb and the Flag'--half-way down the Mall.

Now 'The Lamb and the Flag' enjoyed a low reputation, and for a citizen of ordinary respectability to be seen entering it at that hour--well, it invited surmise. But I knew Mr. Jenkinson to be above suspicion; he might be the ground-landlord--I had heard of his purchasing several small bits of property about the town. In short, it was almost with consternation that, following into the dirty bar, I surprised him in the act of raising a gla.s.s of brandy to his lips with a trembling hand.

I certainly took him aback, and he almost dropped the gla.s.s.

"Excuse me, Dr. Frampton," he stammered, "pray do not think--this indulgence--not a habit, I a.s.sure you. Oh, doctor! I have pa.s.sed a fearful night!"

"Indeed?" said I sympathetically. "If my services can be of use--"

"No, no," he interrupted, paused, and seemed to consider.

"At least, not yet."

"It seems, then, that I am doubly inopportune," I said, "for I have been following you to ask a small favour--not for myself, but for a certain Major Dignum, at the Grand Pump Hotel; nothing more than the attesting of a signature--a mere matter of form."

"Major Dignum? Ah, yes! the name is familiar to me from the _Courant's_ Visitors' List." Mr. Jenkinson pa.s.sed an agitated hand across his forehead. "I cannot recall seeing him in my shop. By all means, doctor--to oblige the gentleman--in my unhappy frame of mind-- it will be a--a distraction."

So back I led the jeweller, explaining on the way how I had caught sight of him from the hotel window, and ushered him up to the apartment where the Major sat impatiently awaiting us.

"Good morning, sir," the Major began, with a bow. "So your name's Jenkinson? Most extraordinary! I--I am pleased to hear it, sir."

"Extraordinary!" the Major repeated, as he bent over the papers to sign them. "I am asking you, Mr. Jenkinson, to witness this signature to my last will and testament. In the midst of life--by the way, what is your Christian name?"

"William, sir."

"Incredible!" The Major bounced up from his chair and sat down again trembling, while he fumbled with his waistcoat pocket. "Ah, no!--to be sure--I gave it to my seconds," he muttered. "In the midst of life--"

"You may well say so, sir!" The jeweller took a seat and adjusted his spectacles as I sanded the Major's signature and pushed the doc.u.ment across the table. "A man," Mr. Jenkinson continued, dipping his pen wide of the ink-pot, "on the point of exchanging time for eternity--"

"That thought is peculiarly unpleasant to me just now," the Major interrupted. "May I beg you not to enlarge upon it?"

"But I _must_, sir!" cried out Mr. Jenkinson, as though the words were wrested from him by an inward agony; and tearing open his coat, he plucked a packet of folded papers from his breast-pocket and slapped it down upon the table. "You have called me in, gentlemen, to witness a will. I ask you in return to witness mine--which must be at least ten times as urgent."

"Another will!" I glanced at the Major, who stared wildly about him, but could only mutter: "Jenkinson! William Jenkinson!"

"To-morrow, sir," pursued the jeweller, his voice rising almost to a scream, "you may have forgotten the transient fears which drove you to this highly proper precaution. For you the sun will s.h.i.+ne, the larks sing, your blood will course with its accustomed liveliness, and your breast expand to the health-giving breeze. I don't blame you for it--oh, dear, no! not in the least. But you will admit it's a totally different thing to repose beneath the churchyard sod on a mere point of honour, with an a.s.sa.s.sin's bullet in your heart--not to mention that he threatened to tear it out and fling it to the crows!"

"The deuce!" shouted the Major, "your heart, did you say?"

"I did, sir."

"You are quite sure! Your heart?--you are certain it was your heart?

Not your liver? Think, man!"

"He did not so much as allude to that organ, sir, though I have no doubt he was capable of it."

While we gazed upon one another, lost in a maze of extravagant surmise, a riotous rush of feet took the staircase by storm, and the door crashed open before two hilarious Irishmen, of whom the spokesman wore the reddest thatch of hair it has ever been my lot to cast eyes on. The other, so far as I can remember, confined his utterances to frequent, vociferous, and wholly inarticulate cries of the chase.

The Major presented them to us as Captain Tom O'Halloran and Mr.