The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales Part 31

"Oh," said I, "a town with so many in the fire--"

"And I thought, perhaps, if we could manage to connect it in some way with the Primrose League--"

"But what can it have to do with the Primrose League?" I asked stiffly.

I will admit now to a slight prejudice against the Ambulance business-- due perhaps to the lecturer's having chosen to start it in my absence.

Sir Felix was disappointed, and showed it. "Why, it was you," he reminded me, "who helped us last year by setting the widows to race for a leg of mutton."

"I was a symbolist in those days. And, excuse me, Sir Felix, it was not last year, but the year before. Last year we had the surrender of Cronje at Paardeberg, with the widows dressed up as Boer women."

"Is that so? I thought we had Cronje two years ago, but no doubt you are right. Now I thought that, with our Primrose fete coming on, and everybody just now taking such an interest in the Empire--"

"To be sure!" I cried. "'First Aid to the Empire'--it will look well on the bills."

Sir Felix rubbed his hands together--a trick of his when he is pleased.

"It's an idea, eh?"

"A brilliant one."

"Well, but you haven't heard all." He looked at me almost slyly.

"It occurred to me, that while--er--a.s.sociating this enthusiasm of ours with the imperial idea, we might at the same time do a good turn for ourselves. You think that permissible?"

"Permissible? For what else does an empire exist?"

"Quite so. As I was saying to Lady Williams, only this morning, we must bring _home_ to less thoughtful persons a sense of its beneficence.

Now it occurs to me: why go on subscribing to these great public Nursing Funds, in which our mite is a mere drop in the ocean, when by sending up a nurse from our own town--she would, of course, be a member of the League--not only should we have the satisfaction of knowing that our help is effective, but the young woman would be earning a salary and supporting herself?"

"Admirable!" said I. "It would look so much better in the papers too."

"You see, we have at this moment a score of young women, all natives of the town and members of the League, undergoing instruction from our lecturer. After the course there will be an examination; and then, with the lecturer's help--and the advice, if I might suggest it, of Lady Williams, who can tell him if the candidate's family be respectable and deserving--we can surely select a young person to do us credit."

Sir Felix took his departure in the cheerfullest temper, and I record his suggestion as one eminently worthy of his head and his heart, although subsequent events have, alas! brought it to nought. I doubt if we shall send up a nurse from Troy; indeed, I doubt if there will even be an examination.

Last evening the Young Women's Christian a.s.sociation attended its sixth Ambulance lecture. The subject--roller bandaging--being a practical one, a small boy was had in, set on the platform, and bandaged in sight of the audience--plain bandaged, reverse bandaged, figure-of-eight bandaged, bandaged on forefinger, thumb, hand, wrist and forearm, elbow, shoulder, knee, ankle, foot. He declares that he enjoyed himself thoroughly. After each demonstration the young women took a turn and practised with such a.s.siduity that an hour slipped pleasantly away.

The bandages were applied, the spirals neatly st.i.tched, and the st.i.tches promptly snipped for the next pupil to begin. An occasional p.r.i.c.k with the needle evoked no more than a playful remonstrance from the boy and a ripple of laughter from the fair executants. At length, alas! Miss Sophy Rabling, in snipping her bandage from the boy's foot, fumbled and drove a point of the scissors sharply into his toe.

With a howl he caught at his foot, from which one or two drops of blood were trickling. And the sight of it so affected Miss Sophy that she dropped upon the platform in a swoon. A cla.s.s-mate in the body of the hall almost instantly followed her example.

The lecturer, I am bound to say, behaved admirably. So far was he from losing his head, that he instantly seized on the accident to turn it to account.

"First aid!" he cried. "Subject: Fainting. Patient No. 1, head to be pressed down below her knees and kept there for a few minutes.

Patient No. 2, to be extended on the floor, care being taken to keep head and body level. A form being handy, we could, as an alternative, have hung Patient No. 1 over it, head downwards."

But at this point, unfortunately, the humour of the situation became too much for Miss Gertrude Hansombody, another of the students. She began to t.i.tter, went on to laugh uncontrollably, then to clench her hands and sob.

"Subject: Hysterics!" called the lecturer. "Treatment: Be firm with the patient, hold her firmly by the wrists and threaten her with cold water--"

He spoke to empty benches. The rest of his pupils had escaped from the room and were now on their way home, and running for dear life.

I do not expect that St. John of Jerusalem will figure prominently in our Primrose fete. My reason for saying so is an urgent letter just received from Sir Felix, who wishes to confer with me in the course of the day.

c.o.x _VERSUS_ PRETYMAN.

We are not litigious in Troy, and we obey the laws of England cheerfully if we sometimes claim to interpret them in our own way. I leave others to determine whether the Chief Constable's decision, that one policeman amply suffices for us, be an effect or a cause, but certain it is that we rarely trouble any court, and almost never that of a.s.size.

This accounts in part for the popular interest awakened by the suit of c.o.x _versus_ Pretyman, heard a few days ago at the Bodmin a.s.sizes. I say "in part," because the case presented (as the newspapers phrase it) some unusual features, and differed noticeably from the ordinary Action for Breach of Promise. "No harm in that," you will say? Indeed no; and we should have regarded it as no more than our due but for an apprehension that the conduct alleged against the defendant concerned us all by compromising the good name of our town.

At any rate, last Wednesday found the streets full of citizens hurrying to the railway station, and throughout the morning our stationmaster had difficulty in handling the traffic. The journey to Bodmin is not a long one as the crow flies, but, as our carpenter, Mr. Hansombody, put it, "we are not crows, and, that being the case, naturally resent being packed sixteen in a compartment." Mr. Hansombody taxed the Great Western Company with lack of foresight in not running excursion trains, and appealed to me to support his complaint. I argued (with the general approval of our fellow-travellers) that there was something heartless in the idea of an excursion to listen to the recital of a woman's wrongs, especially of Miss c.o.x's, whom we had known so long and esteemed.

Driven from this position, Mr. Hansombody took a fresh stand on the superiority of the old broad-gauge carriages; and this, since it raised no personal question, we discussed in very good humour while we unpacked and ate our luncheons.

In the midst of our meal a lady at the far end of the compartment heaved a sigh and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed "Poor thing!"--which at once set us off discussing the case anew. We agreed that such conduct as Pretyman's was fortunately rare amongst us. We tried to disclaim him--no easy matter, since his father and mother had been natives of Troy, and he had spent all his life in our midst. The lady in the corner challenged Mr.

Hansombody to deny that our town was deteriorating--the rising generation more mischievous than its parents, and given to mitching from school, and cigarette smoking, if not to worse.

Now this was a really damaging attack, for Mr. Hansombody not only presides over our School Board, but has a son in the tobacco business.

He met it magnificently. "He would dismiss (he said) the cigarette question as one upon which--Heaven knew with how little justice!--he might be suspected of private bias; but on the question of truancy he had something to say, and he would say it. To begin with, he would admit that the children in Troy played truant; the percentage of school attendance was abnormally low. Yes, he admitted the fact, and thanked the lady for having called attention to it, since it bore upon the subject now uppermost in our minds. He had here"--and he drew from his pocket a magazine article--"some statistics to which he would invite our attention. They showed the average school attendance in Cornwall to be lower than in any county of England or Wales. _But_"--and Mr.

Hansombody raised his forefinger--"the same statistician in the very same paper proves the average of criminal prosecutions in Cornwall to be the lowest in England and Wales."

"And you infer--" I began as he paused triumphantly.

"I infer nothing, sir. I leave the inference to be drawn by our faddists in education, and I only hope they'll enjoy it."

Well, apart from its bearing on Mr. Hansombody's position as Chairman of our Board (which we forbore to examine), this discovery consoled us somewhat and amused us a great deal until we reached Bodmin, when we hurried at once to the a.s.size Court.

I have said that the action, c.o.x _v._ Pretyman, was for damages for Breach of Promise of Marriage. Both parties are natives and paris.h.i.+oners of Fowey, and attend the same place of wors.h.i.+p.

The plaintiff, Miss Rebecca c.o.x, earns her living as a dressmaker's a.s.sistant; the defendant is our watch-maker, and opened a shop of his own but a few months before approaching Miss c.o.x with proposals of marriage. This was fifteen years ago. I may mention that some kind of counter-claim was put in "for goods delivered"; the goods in question being a musical-box and sundry small articles for parlour amus.e.m.e.nt, such as a solitaire-tray, two packs of "Patience" cards, a race-game, and the like. But the defendant did not allege that these had been sent or accepted as whole or partial quittance of his contract to marry, and I can only suppose that he pleaded them in mitigation of damages.

Miss c.o.x asked for one hundred and fifty pounds.

Her evidence was given in quiet but resolute tones, and for some time disclosed nothing sensational. The circ.u.mstances in which Mr. Pretyman had sued for and obtained the promise of her hand differed in no important particular from those which ordinarily attend the _fiancailles_ of respectable young persons in Troy; and for twelve years his courts.h.i.+p ran an even course. "After this," a.s.serted Miss c.o.x, "his attentions cooled. He was friendly and kind enough when we met, and still talked of enlarging his shop-front and marrying in the near future. But his visits were not frequent enough to be called courting."

Of late, though living in the same street, she had only seen him on Sundays; and even so he would be occupied almost all the day and evening with services, Sunday school, prayer-meetings, and occasional addresses.

At length she taxed him with indifference, and, finding his excuses unsatisfactory, was persuaded by her friends to bring the present action. She liked the man well enough; but for the last two or three years "his heart hadn't been in it. He didn't do any proper courting."

Defendant's counsel (a young man) attempted in cross-examination to lead Miss c.o.x to reveal herself as an exacting young woman.

"Do you a.s.sert that at length you came to see nothing of defendant during the week?"

"Only through the shop window as I went by to my work. And of late, when he saw me coming, he would screw a magnifying gla.s.s in his eye and pretend to be busy with his watch-making. I believe he did it to avoid looking at me, and also because he knew I couldn't bear him with his face screwed up. It makes such a difference to his appearance."

"Gently, gently, Miss c.o.x! You must not give us your mere suppositions.

Now, did he never pay you a visit, or take you for a walk, say on Wednesdays? That would be early-closing day, I believe."

"Never for the last three years, sir, after he became a Freemason.

Wednesdays was lodge-night."

"Well then, on Sat.u.r.day, after shop hours?"