Tales from Blackwood Volume Vi Part 5

"Do you know, Tom, it looks uncommonly like a piece of deliberate humbug!"

"Your ignorance misleads you, Fred. You would not say so had you seen her. So sweet--so gentle--with such a tinge of melancholy resignation in her eye, like that of a virgin martyr about to suffer at the stake! No one could look upon her for a moment and doubt her purity and truth."

"Perhaps. But you must allow that we are not living exactly in the age of romance. An elopement with an officer of dragoons is about the farthest extent of legitimate enterprise which is left to a modern damsel; and, upon my word, I think the story would have told better, had some such hero been inserted as a sort of counterpoise to the Jew. But what's the matter? Have you lost anything?"

"It is very odd!" said Strachan, "I am perfectly certain that I had on my emerald studs last night. I recollect that Dorothea admired them exceedingly. Where on earth can I have put them?"

"I don't know, I'm sure. I suspect, Tom, you and the Bailie were rather convivial after supper. Is your watch wound up?"

"Of course it is. I a.s.sure you you are quite wrong. It was a mere matter of four or five tumblers. Very odd this! Why--I can't find my watch neither!"

"Hallo! what the deuce! Have we fallen into a den of thieves? This is a nice beginning to our circuit practice."

"I could swear, Fred, that I put it below my pillow before I went to sleep. I remember, now, that it was some time before I could fit in the key. What can have become of it?"

"And you have not left your room since?"

"No, on my word of honour!"

"Pooh--pooh! Then it can't possibly be gone. Look beneath the bolster."

But in vain did we search beneath bolster, mattress, and blankets; yea, even downwards to the fundamental straw. Not a trace was to be seen of c.o.x Savoury's horizontal lever, jewelled, as Tom pathetically remarked, in four special holes, and warranted to go for a year without more than a minute's deviation. Neither were the emerald studs, the pride of Strachan's heart, forthcoming. Boots, chambermaid, and waiter were collectively summoned--all a.s.sisted in the search, and all a.s.severated their own integrity.

"Are ye sure, sir, that ye brocht them hame?" said the waiter, an acute lad, who had served his apprentices.h.i.+p at a commercial tavern in the Gorbals; "Ye was gey an' fou when ye cam in here yestreen."

"What do you mean, you rascal?"

"Ye ken ye wadna gang to bed till ye had anither tumbler."

"Don't talk tras.h.!.+ It was the weakest cold-without in the creation."

"And then ye had a sair fecht on politics wi' anither man in the coffee-room."

"Ha! I remember now--the bagman, who is a member of the League! Where is the commercial villain?"

"He gaed aff at sax preceesely, this morning, in his gig, to Kelso."

"Then, by the head of Thistlewood!" cried Strachan, frantically, "my ticker will be turned into tracts against the Corn-laws!"

"Hoot na!" said the waiter, "I canna think that. He looked an unco respectable-like man."

"No man can be respectable," replied the aristocratic Thomas, "who sports such infernal opinions as I heard him utter last night. My poor studs! Fred--they were a gift from Mary Rivers before we quarrelled, and I would not have lost them for the universe! Only think of them being exposed for sale at a free-trade bazaar!"

"Come, Tom--they may turn up yet."

"Never in this world, except at a p.a.w.nbroker's. I could go mad to think that my last memorial of Mary is in all probability glittering in the unclean s.h.i.+rt of a bagman!"

"Had you not better apply to the Fiscal?"

"For what purpose? Doubtless the scoundrel has driven off to the nearest railway, and is triumphantly counting the mile-posts as he steams to his native Leeds. No, Fred. Both watch and studs are gone beyond the hope of redemption."

"The loss is certainly a serious one."

"No doubt of it: but a thought strikes me. You recollect the edict, _nautae_, _caupones_, _stabularii_? I have not studied the civil law for nothing, and am clearly of opinion that in such a case the landlord is liable."

"By Jove! I believe you are right. But it would be as well to turn up Shaw and Dunlop for a precedent before you make any row about it.

Besides, it may be rather difficult to establish that you lost them at the inn."

"If they only refer the matter to my oath, I can easily settle that point," replied Strachan. "Besides, now that I think of it, Miss Percy can speak to the watch. She asked me what o'clock it was just before we parted on the stairs."

"Eh, what! Is the lady in this house?"

"To be sure--did I not tell you so?"

"I say, Tom--couldn't you contrive to let one have a peep at this angel of yours?"

"Quite impossible. She is the shyest creature in the world, and would shrink from the sight of a stranger."

"But, my dear Tom----"

"I can't do it, I tell you; so it's no use asking me."

"Well, I must say you are abominably selfish. But what on earth are you going to do with that red-and-blue Joinville? You can't go down to court without a white neckcloth."

"I am not going down to court."

"Why, my good fellow! what on earth is the meaning of this?"

"I am not going down to court, that's all. I say, Fred, how do I look in this sort of thing?"

"Uncommonly like a c.o.c.k-pheasant in full plumage. But tell me what you mean?"

"Why, since you must needs know, I am going up-stairs to breakfast with Miss Percy."

So saying, Mr Strachan made me a polite bow, and left the apartment. I took my solitary way to the court-house, marvelling at the extreme rapidity of the effect which is produced by the envenomed darts of Cupid.

CHAPTER II.

On entering the court, I found that the business had commenced. An enormous raw-boned fellow, with a shock of the fieriest hair, and hands of such dimensions that a mere glimpse of them excited unpleasant sensations at your windpipe, was stationed at the bar, to which, from previous practice, he had acquired a sort of prescriptive right.

"James M'Wilkin, or Wilkinson, or Wilson," said the presiding judge, in a tone of disgust which heightened with each successive alias, "attend to the indictment which is about to be preferred against you."

And certainly, if the indictment contained a true statement of the facts, James M'Wilkin, or Wilkinson, or Wilson, was about as thoroughpaced a marauder as ever perambulated a common. He was charged with sheep-stealing and a.s.sault; inasmuch as, on a certain night subsequent to the Kelso fair, he, the said individual with the plural denominations, did wickedly and feloniously steal, uplift, and away take from a field adjoining to the Northumberland road, six wethers, the property, or in the lawful possession, of Jacob Gubbins, grazier, then and now, or lately, residing in Morpeth; and, moreover, on being followed by the said Gubbins, who demanded rest.i.tution of his property, he, the said M'Wilkin, &c. had, in the most brutal manner, struck, knocked down, and lavished divers kicks upon the corporality of the Northumbrian b.u.mpkin, to the fracture of three of his ribs, and otherwise to the injury of his person.

During the perusal of this formidable doc.u.ment by the clerk, M'Wilkin stood scratching his poll, and leering about him as though he considered the whole ceremony as a sort of solemn joke. I never in the course of my life cast eyes on a more nonchalant or unmitigated ruffian.

"How do you say, M'Wilkin?" asked the judge; "are you guilty or not guilty?"