THE CITY OF LONDON.
It was a considerably abridged version of his visit to Richmond which
Mrs. Ringrose received from her son. Gordon Lowndes had indeed given
Harry free leave to tell his mother what he liked, but not even to her
could the boy bring himself to repeat all that he had seen and heard.
He preferred to quote the frank admissions of Lowndes himself, and that
with reticence and a definite object. It was Harry's ambition to remove
his mother's bitterness against the young woman who had never been to
see her; and, by explaining the matter as it had been explained to him,
he easily succeeded, since Mrs. Ringrose would have sympathised and
sorrowed with her worst enemy when that enemy was in distress. In
uprooting one prejudice, however, her son went near to planting another
in its stead.
"I only hope, my boy, that you are not going to fall in love with her."
"Mother!"
"She seems to have made a deep impression on you."
"But not that sort of impression! She is a fine creature, I can see,
and we got on capitally together. We shall probably become the best of
friends. But you need have no fears on any other score. Why, she must
be ever so much older than I am."
"She is twenty-seven. He told me so."
"There you are! Twenty-seven!" cried Harry, triumphantly.
But it was not a triumph he enjoyed. Twenty-seven seemed a great age to
him, and six years an impassable gulf. Doubtless it was just as well,
especially when a person did not in the least resemble another person's
ideal; still, he had not supposed she was so old as that. He wished he
had not been told her age. Certainly it gave him a sense of safety,
just as he was beginning to wonder what the view would be like from
Richmond Hill to-day. But it was a little dull to feel so safe as all
that.
This was the day on which Harry Ringrose had intended to pack up his
African curios and send them off to Lowndes's office. But, after the
conversation of which the above was a snatch, his mother charged him to
do nothing of the kind. If Mr. Lowndes was in such difficulties, it was
certainly not their place to add to them by claiming further favours at
his hands. Harry agreed, but said the idea had originated with Lowndes
himself. His mother was firm on the point, and counselled him either to
sell his own wares or to listen to her and give up the idea.
So Harry haunted the Kensington Public Library, and patiently waited
his turn for such journals as the _Exchange and Mart_. But it was in an
evening paper that he came across the advertisement which brought the
first grist to his mill. A lady in a suburb guaranteed good prices for
secondhand books, left-off jewellery, and all kinds of bric-à-brac and
"articles of vertu," and inserted her advertisement in places as
original as itself. It caught Harry's eye more than once before the
idea occurred to him; but at length he made his way to that suburb with
a pair of ostrich eggs, an assegai, and a battle-axe studded with
brass-headed nails. He came back with a basket of strawberries, a pot
of cream, and several shillings in his pocket. Next evening a
post-office order to the amount of that first-class fare to London was
remitted to Gordon Lowndes, while a new silk hat hung on the pegs, to
give the boy a chance in the City. All that now remained of the curios
were one pair of ostrich eggs and a particularly murderous tomahawk,
with which Harry himself chopped up the empty packing-cases to save in
firewood.
So a few days passed, and the new clothes came home, and Harry Ringrose
was externally smart enough for the Stock Exchange itself, before the
first letter came from Uncle Spencer. He had spoken to several of the
business men among his congregation, but, he regretted to say, with but
little result so far. Not that this had surprised him, as conscience
had of course forbidden him to represent his nephew as other than he
was in respect of that training and those qualifications in which Harry
was so lamentably deficient. He understood that for every vacant post
there were some hundreds of applicants, all of whom could write
shorthand and keep books, while the majority had taken the trouble to
master at least one foreign language. Harry had probably learned French
at school, but doubtless he had wasted his opportunities in that as in
other branches. Shorthand, however, appeared to be the most essential
requirement, and, as it was unfortunately omitted from the
public-school curriculum, Mr. Walthew was sending Harry a "Pitman's
Guide," in the earnest hope that he would immediately apply himself to
the mastery of this first step to employment and independence.
Meanwhile, one gentleman, whose name and address were given, had said
that he would be glad to see Henry if he cared to call, and of course
it was just possible that something might come of it. Henry would
naturally leave no stone unturned, and would call on this gentleman
without delay. Uncle Spencer, however, did not fail to add that he was
not himself sanguine of the result.
"He never is," said Harry. "What's the good of going?"
"You must do what your uncle says," replied Mrs. Ringrose, to whom the
letter had been written.
"But what's the good if he's given me away beforehand? He will have
told the fellow I can't even write an office fist, and am generally no
use, so why should he take me on? And if the fellow isn't going to take
me on, why on earth should I go and see him?"
Mrs. Ringrose pointed out that this was begging the question, and
reminded Harry that his Uncle Spencer took a pessimistic view of
everything. She herself then went to the opposite extreme.
"I think it an excellent sign that he should want to see you at all,
and I feel sure that when he does see you he will want to snap you up.
What a good thing you have your new clothes to go in! Your uncle
doesn't say what the business is, but I am quite convinced it has
something to do with Africa, and that your experience out there is the
very thing they want. So be sure that you agree to nothing until we
have talked it over."
Harry spent a few minutes in somewhat pusillanimous contemplation of
the Pitman hieroglyphs, wondering if he should ever master them, and
whether it would help him so very much if he did. It was not that he
was afraid of work, for he only asked to be put into harness at once
and driven as hard as they pleased. But it was a different matter to be
told first to break oneself in; and to begin instantly and in earnest
and alone required a higher order of moral courage than Harry could
command just then.
But he went into the City that same forenoon, and he saw the gentleman
referred to in his uncle's letter. The interview was not more
humiliating than many another to which Harry submitted at the same
bidding; but it was the first, and it hurt most at the time. No sooner
had it begun than Harry realised that he had no clue as to the
relations subsisting between Mr. Walthew and the man of business, nor
yet as to what had passed between them on the subject of himself, and
he saw too late that he had allowed himself to be placed in a
thoroughly false position. It looked, however, as though the clergyman
had been less frank than he professed, for Harry was put through a
second examination, and his admissions received with the most painful
tokens of surprise. He was even asked for a specimen of his
handwriting, which self-consciousness made less legible than ever; in
the end his name was taken, "in case we should hear of anything," and
he was bowed out with broken words of gratitude on his lips and bitter
curses in his heart.
He went home vowing that he never would submit to that indignity again:
yet again and again he did.
Mr. Walthew was informed of the result of the interview which he had
instigated, and wrote back to say how little it surprised him. But he
mentioned another name and another address, and, in short, sent his
nephew hat-in-hand to some half-dozen of his friends and acquaintances,
none of whom showed even a momentary inclination to give the lad a
trial. Harry did not blame them, but he did blame his uncle for making
him a suppliant in one unlikely quarter after another. Yet he never
refused to go when it came to the point; for, though a week slipped by
without his learning to write a line of shorthand, Harry Ringrose had
character enough not to neglect a chance--no matter how slight--for
fear of a rebuff--no matter how brutal.
Yet he never forgot the exquisite misery of those unwarrantable begging
interviews: the excitement of seeking for the office in the swarming,
heated labyrinth of the City--the depression of the long walk home with
another blank drawn from the bag. How he used to envy the smart youths
in the short black jackets and the shiny hats--all doing something--all
earning something! And how stolidly he looked the other way when in one
or two of those youths he recognised a schoolfellow. How could he face
anybody he had ever known before?--an idler, a pauper, and disgraced.
They would only cut him as he had been cut that first morning on his
way to the old home; therefore he cut them.
But one day he was forced to break this sullen rule: his arm was
grabbed by the man he had all but passed, and a sallow London face
compelled his recognition.
"You're a nice one, Ringrose!" said a voice with the London twang. "Is
it so many years since you shared a cabin on a ship called the
_Sobraon_, with a chap of the name of Barker?"
"I'm awfully sorry," cried Harry with a blush. "You--I wasn't looking
for any one I knew. How are you, Barker?"
"Oh, as well as a Johnny can be in this hole of a City. Thinking of
knocking up again and getting the gov'nor to send me another long
voyage. I'm not a man of leisure like you, Ringrose. What brings _you_
here?"
"Oh, I've only been to see a man," said Harry, without technical
untruth.
"I pictured you loafin' about that rippin' old place in the photos you
used to have up in our cabin. Not gone to Oxford yet, then?"
"No--the term doesn't begin till October. But----" Harry tried to tell
the truth here, but the words choked him, and the moment passed.
"Not till October! Four clear months! What a chap you are, Ringrose; it
makes me want to do you an injury, upon my Sam it does. Look at me! At
it from the blessed week after I landed--at it from half-past nine to
six, and all for a measly thirty-five bob a week. How would you like
that, eh? How would you like that?"
Harry's mouth watered, but he said he didn't know, and contrived to
force another smile as he held out a trembling hand.
"Got to be going, have you?" said the City youth. "I thought you
bloated Johnnies were never in a hurry? Well, well, give a poor devil a
thought sometimes, cooped up at a desk all day long. Good-bye--you
lucky dog!"
The tears were in Harry's eyes as he went his way, yet the smile was
still upon his lips, and it was grimly genuine now. If only the envious
Barker knew where the envy really lay! How was it he did not? To the
conscious wretch it was a revelation that all the world was not
conversant with his disappointment and his disgrace.
To think that he had talked of going up to Oxford next term! It had
never been quite decided, and he blushed to think how he must have
spoken of it at sea. Still more was he ashamed of his want of common
pluck in pretending for a moment that he was going up still.
"'Pluck lost, all lost,'" he thought, remorsefully; "and I've lost it
already! Oh, what would Innes think of me, for carrying his motto in my
heart when I don't need it, and never acting on it when I do!"
That night he wrote it out on the back of a visiting card, and tacked
the tiny text to the wall above his bed:--
"MONEY LOST--LITTLE LOST HONOUR LOST--MUCH LOST PLUCK LOST--ALL LOST."
And his old master's motto sent Harry Ringrose with a stout heart on
many another errand to the City, and steeled and strengthened him when
he came home hopeless in the evening. Yet it was very, very hard to
live up to; and many also were the unworthy reactions which afflicted
him in those dark summer days, that he had expected to be so free from
care, and so full of happiness.
* * * * *
One afternoon he crept down from a stockbroker's office, feeling
smaller than ever (for that stockbroker had made the shortest work yet
of him), to see a man selling halfpenny papers over a placard that
proclaimed "extraordinary scoring at Lord's." A spirit of recklessness
came over Harry, and buying a paper was but the thin end of his
extravagance. A minute later he had counted his money and found enough
to take him to St. John's Wood and into the ground; and it was still
the money that he had obtained for his curios; and town was intolerable
with that sinister London heat which none feel more than your seasoned
salamander from the tropics. Harry's new clothes were sticking to him,
and he thought how delicious it would be at Lord's. To think was to
argue. What was sixpence after all? He had had no lunch, and that would
have cost him sixpence more or less; he would do without any lunch, and
go to Lord's instead.
It was delicious there, and Harry was so lucky as to squeeze into a
seat. Quite a breeze, undreamt of in the City, blew across the ground,
blowing the flannels of the players against their bodies and fetching
little puffs of dust from the pitch. The wicket was crumbling, the long
scores of the morning were at an end. It was only the tail of the
Middlesex team that Harry was in time to see batting, but they were
good enough for him. All his life he had nourished a hopeless passion
for the game, and every care was forgotten until the last man was out.
"Why--Harry?"
He had been looking at the pitch, and he spun round like an arrested
criminal. Yet the strong hand on his shoulder was also delicate and
full of kindness, and he was gazing into the best face he had ever
seen. His ideal woman he was still to find, but his ideal man he had
loved and worshipped from his twelfth year; and here he stood, supple
and athletic as ever, only slimmer and graver; and their hands were
locked.
"Mr. Innes!"
"I had no idea you were in England, Harry."
"I have been back three weeks."
"Why didn't you write?"
He knew everything. Harry saw it in the kind, strong face, and heard it
in a voice rich with sympathy and reproach.
"I was too ashamed," he murmured--and he hung his head.
"You might have trusted me, old fellow," said Mr. Innes. "Come and sit
on top of the pavilion and tell me all about yourself."
At any other time it would have been a sufficient joy to Harry Ringrose
to set foot in that classic temple of the sacred game; now he had eyes
for nothing and nobody but the man who led him up the steps, through
the cricketing throng, up the stairs. And when they sat together on
top, and the ground was cleared, and play resumed, not another ball did
Harry watch with intelligent eyes. He was sitting with the man to whom
he had been too proud to write, but whose disciple he had been at heart
for many a year. He was talking to the object of his early
hero-worship, and he found him his hero still.
Mr. Innes listened attentively, gravely, but said very little himself.
He appreciated the difficulty of starting in life without money or
influence, and was too true a friend to make light of it. He thought
that business would be best if only an opening could be found.
Schoolmastering led to nothing unless one had money or a degree. Still
they must think and talk it over, and Harry must come down to Guildford
and see the new chapel and the swimming-bath. Could he come for a day
or two before the end of the term? Was he sure he could leave his
mother? Harry was quite sure, but would write when he got home.
Then it was time for Mr. Innes to go, but first he gave Harry tea in
the members' dining-room, and after that a lift in his hansom as far as
Piccadilly. So that Harry reached home both earlier and in better case
than he might have done; whereupon Mrs. Ringrose, hearing his key in
the latch, came out to meet him with a face of mystery which contrasted
oddly with his radiance.
"Oh, mother," he cried, "whom do you think I've seen! Innes! Innes! and
he's the same as ever, and wants me to go and stay with him, so you
were right, and I was wrong! What is it then? Who's here?" His voice
sank in obedience to her gestures.
"Your Uncle Spencer," she whispered, tragically.
"Delighted to see him," cried Harry, who had been made much too happy
by one man to be readily depressed by any other.
"He has been waiting to see you since five o'clock, my boy."
"Has he? Very sorry to hear that, uncle," said Harry, bursting into the
sitting-room and greeting the clergyman with the heartiness he was
feeling for all the world. Mr. Walthew looked at his watch.
"Since a quarter before five, Mary," said he, "and now it wants seven
minutes to six. Not that I shall grudge the delay if it be attributable
to the only cause I can imagine to account for it. The circumstances,
Henry, are hardly those which warrant levity; if you have indeed been
successful at last, as I hope to hear----"
"Successful, uncle?"
"I understand that you have been to see the gentleman on the Stock
Exchange, who was kind enough to say that he would see you, and of whom
I wrote to you yesterday?"
"So I have! I had quite forgotten that."
"Forgotten it?" cried Mr. Walthew.
"I beg your pardon, Uncle Spencer," said Harry, respectfully enough;
"but since I saw your friend I have been with Mr. Innes my old
schoolmaster, the best man in the whole world, and I am afraid it has
put the other interview right out of my head."
"He did give you an interview, however?"
"Yes, for about a minute."
"And nothing came of it, as usual?" sneered the clergyman.
"And nothing came of it--as usual--I am very sorry to say, Uncle
Spencer."
"And what time was this?"
"Between two and three."
"You must excuse me, Henry, but I am doing my best to obtain employment
for you--I cannot say I have much hope now--still, I am doing my best,
and I am naturally interested in the use you make of your time. May I
ask--as I think I have a right to ask--where you have spent the
afternoon?"
"Certainly, Uncle Spencer; at Lord's Cricket-ground."
Harry was well aware that he had delivered a bombshell, and he quite
expected to receive a broadside in return. But he had forgotten Uncle
Spencer's mode of expressing superlative displeasure. It has been said
that Mr. Walthew never smiled, but there were occasions when a weird
grin shed a sort of storm-light on his habitual gloom. That was when
indignation baffled invective, and righteous anger fell back on holy
scorn. The present was an occasion in point.
Mr. Walthew stared at Harry without a word, but gradually this unlovely
look broke out upon him, and at last he positively chuckled in his
beard.
"You are out of work, and too incompetent to obtain any," said he, "and
yet you can waste your own time and your mother's money in watching a
cricket-match!"
"I went without my lunch in order to do so," was Harry's defence. "And
besides, it was my money--I got it for my spears and things."
"And you call that your money?" cried Uncle Spencer. "I would not talk
about my money until I was paying for my board and residence under this
roof!"
"Now, that will do!" cried Mrs. Ringrose. "That is my business,
Spencer, and I will not allow you to speak so to my boy."
"Come, come, mother," Harry interrupted, "my uncle is quite right from
his point of view. I admit I had qualms about going to Lord's myself.
But I think I must have been meant to go--I know there was some meaning
in my meeting Innes."
"If anything could surprise me in you, Henry," resumed Mr. Walthew, "it
would be the Pagan sentiments which you have just pained me by
uttering. May you live to pray forgiveness for your heresy, as also for
your extravagance! But of the latter I will say no more, though I
certainly think, Mary, that where my assistance has been invoked I have
a right to speak my mind. The waste of money is, however, even less
flagrant, in my opinion, than the waste of time. It is now several
days, Henry, since I sent you a guide to shorthand. An energetic and
conscientious fellow, as anxious as you say you are to work for his
daily bread, could have mastered at least the rudiments in the time.
Have you?"
"I told you he had not!" cried Mrs. Ringrose. "How can you expect it,
when every day he has been seeking work in the City? And he comes in so
tired!"
"Not too tired to go to Lord's Cricket-ground, however," was the not
unjust rejoinder. "But perhaps his energy has found another outlet?
Last time I was here he was going to write articles and poems for the
magazines--so I understood. How many have you written, Henry?"
Harry scorned to point out that it was his mother's words which were
being quoted against him, not his own; yet ever since his evening at
Richmond he had been meaning to try his hand at something, and he felt
guilty as he now confessed that he had not written a line.
"I was sure of it!" cried the clergyman. "You talk of getting
employment, but you will not take the trouble to qualify yourself for
the humblest post; you talk of writing, but you will not take the
trouble even to write! Not that I suppose for a moment anything would
come of it if you did! The magazines, Henry, do not open their columns
to young fellows without literary training, any more than houses of
business engage clerks without commercial education or knowledge. Yet
it would be something even if you tried to write! It would be something
if you wrote--as probably you would write--for the waste-paper basket
and the dust-bin. But no, you seem to have no application, no energy,
no sense of duty; and what more I can do for you I fail to see. I have
written several letters on your account; I have risked offending
several friends. Nothing has come of it, and nothing is likely to come
of it until you put your own shoulder to the wheel. I have put mine. I
have done _my_ best. My conscience is an easy one, at any rate."
Mr. Walthew caught up his hat and brought these painful proceedings to
a close by rising abruptly, as though his feelings were too much for
him. Mrs. Ringrose took his hand without a word, and without a word
Harry showed him out.
"So his conscience is easy!" cried the boy, bitterly. "He talks as if
that had been his object--to ease his conscience--not to get me work.
He has sent me round the City like a beggar, and he calls that doing
his best! I had a good mind to tell him what I call it."
"I almost wish you had," said Mrs. Ringrose, shedding tears.
"No, mother, there was too much truth in what he says. I have been
indolent. Nevertheless, I believe Innes will get me something to do.
And meanwhile I intend to have my revenge on Uncle Spencer."
"How, my boy?"
Harry had never looked so dogged.
"By getting something into a magazine within a week."