_Two Skeleton Biographies_
Bertrand Paul Tressider had been born into a fairly well-to-do,
middle-class family. As usual, the unchangeable law of life
governing such things permitted him no choice of parents.
Presumably, therefore, he would consider himself lucky in not
appearing on earth as a Chinese coolie, or, worse still, an African
pygmy.
Having been respectably, if not actually luxuriously, ushered into
"this best of all possible worlds," he at once became the
victim--like everybody else--of environment, heredity and his own
devices. He was another unit of evolution; another tiny speck in the
pattern of the universe; another spark of energy let loose in a
scheme, apparently eternal, for the furtherance of some vast,
unfathomable design.
Except for two or three sisters, who appeared on the scene years
later, he was an only child. At birth he had been endowed with a
very large head. For this reason, his parents watched him closely,
hopeful that he might turn out to be a prime minister, although at
the same time fearful lest he develop into an imbecile. One never
can tell with big heads. Only expert phrenologists know for certain.
A bump or two either way, and...
But there was no occasion to worry. Pretty soon little Bertrand
began to make it quite plain that he wanted his own way in
everything. Also he commenced to exhibit a keen desire to smash
things up--toys, and pots and things; all to the accompaniment of
violent outbursts of temper. It was a happy day for the fond parents
when they definitely accepted this infallible proof of their darling
boy's saneness.
As time went on, Bertrand's over-sized cranium, instead of being
reckoned a possible symptom of idiocy, became the subject of joyful
speculation.
"Mark my words," said Tressider, senior, one evening, when he and his
wife were admiring the way the young prodigy was trying to throttle a
kitten; "he'll be a great lawyer some day."
Bertrand's mother thought not. She was descended from a family which
in the last hundred years had shot forth stray branches delicately
blossomed with Church of England clergymen. She said she quite
thought her son was cut out for a bishop.
Tressider, senior, of lineage far less esthetic, noting young
Bertrand's display of acquisitive gifts, countered with schemes for
the boy's future more in keeping with the world's idea of success.
"No, my dear," he had said, "he'll never be a bishop. He's much too
wise for that. Look how he keeps his chubby hand round the throat of
that kitten where it can't possibly get at him. That's extremely
clever. No, Ethel, dearest, we'll give him a good education, and I
shall be altogether mistaken if he doesn't turn out to be a
highly-successful man, and become rich, and the envy of all his
friends."
"I did so hope," responded Mrs. Tressider gently, "that he would
follow in his Uncle Theobald's footsteps. Such a calm, peaceful
nature he had; so good; so deeply spiritual; so true to his own
church, the only church; not a bit like these modern ministers who go
about converting and upsetting people, and hobnobbing with other
sects; so----"
"For God's sake, don't talk so much, Ethel," interposed Tressider,
senior, irritably, "or else say something more to the point. I
thought we were discussing the boy's future. It isn't to be imagined
for one moment that his talents should be wasted like that. Look at
him! Just look at him now! Take particular notice of the way he
recognizes me as his father. Did you ever see such intelligence
written on a human face? And that head of his--neither too small,
nor yet too big; in fact, just right. And we used to be nervous
about it. Tut! Tut! No, my dear, if that boy doesn't turn out to
be either a Lord Chancellor, or a Viceroy of India, I'll eat my best
silk hat, hang me if I won't. Why only the other morning, Tom
Bett--and you know very well he never exaggerates--told me when he
was signing me up for another thousand-pound insurance policy,
'Tressider, old fellow,' he says, 'that boy of yours is an absolute
marvel, he is, indeed. It's my firm opinion he's smart enough to be
a law----'"
"Why, John, dear, Mr. Bett has never even seen Ber----"
"There you go again, always interrupting me. Let me tell you once
for all that I've finally decided Bertrand shall be a lawyer. He's
almost three years old now--or is it two?--no matter, he----"
"Thirteen months, and three days----"
"No matter, I say. It's quite time we did something about his
future. Life is short--too short. Look at me---fifty gone, and only
a civil service clerk. True, it's the higher civil service; and
we're well off, I know; but what have I really accomplished?
Nothing--absolutely nothing. Let it be a lesson to us. Let us
choose Bertrand's profession for him, and carry the idea out, not
deviating one hair's-breadth from our intention. Let---- There, just
what I expected! That wretched cat isn't to be trusted. Didn't I
tell you not to allow him to play with the thing?----Good Lord, can't
you stop him squalling? I never heard such a row in all my life. Do
something with him for goodness' sake. Feed him. Shove that ring in
his mouth. Something's sticking into him somewhere. Great Scott!
what a vile temper. Shall I tell Harriet to come up and see to him,
dear? I'm going to the club, and I can easily call to her on my way
out. She's bound to be in the kitchen with one of her favourite
flames, I suppose. I shan't be late, dearest. Don't bother sitting
up for me."
* * * * * * * *
So, after deciding, with such admirable judgment, upon making a
lawyer of Bertrand, his parents saw to it that he was well educated.
First he was sent to a select private school which was conducted by
the Misses Arbuthnot--a couple of elderly spinsters who were
distinguished by being distantly related to a major in the Indian
army. At this scholastic temple he was taught to consider it a
frightful vulgarity to laugh in the street when he saw the butcher's
boy set his basket down so as better to chase a cat, whilst a dog
slipped off with the tripe and the mutton chops.
Next he went to a big grammar school where the masters were able to
teach him nearly as much as his companions did; finally he was
pitchforked into the office of a large and successful firm of lawyers
at Sheffield as an articled clerk.
Neither Foggum on Conveyancing, Grabbit on the Law of Entail, Splitup
on Divorce, nor any legal luminary on the whole bag of tricks of
jurisprudence, managed very much to amuse Bertrand. Eventually he
succeeded in making a frightful hash of his final examination, which
event occurred just about the time Barr invented his all-British
Colony scheme in London. Bert promptly seized the legal bit in his
teeth, ran off as though a dozen County Court judges were exploding
behind him, made Barr's acquaintance over a couple of
whiskies-and-soda, then calmly waited for the sailing of the _Lake
Manitoba_.
Bert had never really forgotten the Leatherstocking tales of Fenimore
Cooper; nor yet Mayne Reid's Scalp Hunters; nor all the other Wild
West stories among which he had contrived ingeniously to sandwich his
legal studies. Some irresistible force within himself urged him
towards the great open spaces. The romance of the endless prairies
beckoned to him seductively with its adventurous imaginings. And,
besides, he couldn't help himself. He was in the grip of heredity.
Several of his progenitors had been wanderers. One of them had been
hanged--so his father frequently boasted--by the Spaniards as a
heretic, at Santa Cruz, because he refused to kiss a cross made from
blood-stained Inca gold.
When his father heard of the move, he argued against it--a trifle
weakly though. He himself had many times nursed secret longings for
a career filled with yardarms, pieces of eight, tomahawks and
shark-infested lagoons. Bert was obdurate. With horrible
recklessness, he sacrificed his chances of the Woolsack, greatly to
his father's rather insipidly-expressed disappointment. However,
when the time for the sailing of Barr's pioneering crusaders drew
near, the old gentleman paid his passage, financed him to the tune of
five hundred pounds, and also provided him with an exceedingly
generous kit.
Samuel Adolphus Potts' life history had been much less complicated.
That little man's wits had been tempered in the environment of a
fairly prosperous cab driver's home; rough-ground in a huge jam
factory, among the sophisticated emery wheels of crowds of both
sexes; finally burnished and sharpened as an extra barman in a
not-very-high-class but well-patronized London public house.
Sam's capital consisted of twenty-odd pounds, clear of travelling
expenses--plus an invincible common-sense.