"Ah!" said the sentry, "that's what the papers say, is it?" The sentry's
voice took unconsciously the accent of those from whom no secret is hid.
"I'll tell yer what yer can do," continued the sentry, enjoying an
unaccustomed sense of importance. The sentry glanced left, then right.
"'E's a slipping off all by 'imself down to Osborne by the 6.40 from
Waterloo. Nobody knows it--'cept, o' course, just a few of us. That's
'is way all over. 'E just 'ates--"
A footstep sounded down the corridor. The sentry became statuesque.
At Waterloo, Tommy inspected the 6.40 train. Only one compartment
indicated possibilities, an extra large one at the end of the coach next
the guard's van. It was labelled "Reserved," and in the place of the
usual fittings was furnished with a table and four easy-chairs. Having
noticed its position, Tommy took a walk up the platform and disappeared
into the fog.
Twenty minutes later, Prince Blank stepped hurriedly across the platform,
unnoticed save by half a dozen obsequious officials, and entered the
compartment reserved for him. The obsequious officials bowed. Prince
Blank, in military fashion, raised his hand. The 6.40 steamed out
slowly.
Prince Blank, who was a stout gentleman, though he tried to disguise the
fact, seldom found himself alone. When he did, he generally indulged
himself in a little healthy relaxation. With two hours' run to
Southampton before him, free from all possibility of intrusion, Prince
Blank let loose the buttons of his powerfully built waistcoat, rested his
bald head on the top of his chair, stretched his great legs across
another, and closed his terrible, small eyes.
For an instant it seemed to Prince Blank that a draught had entered into
the carriage. As, however, the sensation immediately passed away, he did
not trouble to wake up. Then the Prince dreamed that somebody was in the
carriage with him--was sitting opposite to him. This being an annoying
sort of dream, the Prince opened his eyes for the purpose of dispelling
it. There was somebody sitting opposite to him--a very grimy little
person, wiping blood off its face and hands with a dingy handkerchief.
Had the Prince been a man capable of surprise, he would have been
surprised.
"It's all right," assured him Tommy. "I ain't here to do any harm. I
ain't an Anarchist."
The Prince, by a muscular effort, retired some four or five inches and
commenced to rebutton his waistcoat.
"How did you get here?" asked the Prince.
"'Twas a bigger job than I'd reckoned on," admitted Tommy, seeking a dry
inch in the smeared handkerchief, and finding none. "But that don't
matter," added Tommy cheerfully, "now I'm here."
"If you do not wish me to hand you over to the police at Southampton, you
had better answer my questions," remarked the Prince drily.
Tommy was not afraid of princes, but in the lexicon of her harassed youth
"Police" had always been a word of dread.
"I wanted to get at you."
"I gather that."
"There didn't seem any other way. It's jolly difficult to get at you.
You're so jolly artful."
"Tell me how you managed it."
"There's a little bridge for signals just outside Waterloo. I could see
that the train would have to pass under it. So I climbed up and waited.
It being a foggy night, you see, nobody twigged me. I say, you are
Prince Blank, ain't you?"
"I am Prince Blank."
"Should have been mad if I'd landed the wrong man."
"Go on."
"I knew which was your carriage--leastways, I guessed it; and as it came
along, I did a drop." Tommy spread out her arms and legs to illustrate
the action. "The lamps, you know," explained Tommy, still dabbing at her
face--"one of them caught me."
"And from the roof?"
"Oh, well, it was easy after that. There's an iron thing at the back,
and steps. You've only got to walk downstairs and round the corner, and
there you are. Bit of luck your other door not being locked. I hadn't
thought of that. Haven't got such a thing as a handkerchief about you,
have you?"
The Prince drew one from his sleeve and passed it to her. "You mean to
tell me, boy--"
"Ain't a boy," explained Tommy. "I'm a girl!"
She said it sadly. Deeming her new friends such as could be trusted,
Tommy had accepted their statement that she really was a girl. But for
many a long year to come the thought of her lost manhood tinged her voice
with bitterness.
"A girl!"
Tommy nodded her head.
"Umph!" said the Prince; "I have heard a good deal about the English
girl. I was beginning to think it exaggerated. Stand up."
Tommy obeyed. It was not altogether her way; but with those eyes beneath
their shaggy brows bent upon her, it seemed the simplest thing to do.
"So. And now that you are here, what do you want?"
"To interview you."
Tommy drew forth her list of questions.
The shaggy brows contracted.
"Who put you up to this absurdity? Who was it? Tell me at once."
"Nobody."
"Don't lie to me. His name?"
The terrible, small eyes flashed fire. But Tommy also had a pair of
eyes. Before their blaze of indignation the great man positively
quailed. This type of opponent was new to him.
"I'm not lying."
"I beg your pardon," said the Prince.
And at this point it occurred to the Prince, who being really a great
man, had naturally a sense of humour, that a conference conducted on
these lines between the leading statesman of an Empire and an impertinent
hussy of, say, twelve years old at the outside, might end by becoming
ridiculous. So the Prince took up his chair and put it down again beside
Tommy's, and employing skilfully his undoubted diplomatic gifts, drew
from her bit by bit the whole story.
"I'm inclined, Miss Jane," said the Great Man, the story ended, "to agree
with our friend Mr. Hope. I should say your _metier_ was journalism."
"And you'll let me interview you?" asked Tommy, showing her white teeth.
The Great Man, laying a hand heavier than he guessed on Tommy's shoulder,
rose. "I think you are entitled to it."
"What's your views?" demanded Tommy, reading, "of the future political
and social relationships--"
"Perhaps," suggested the Great Man, "it will be simpler if I write it
myself."
"Well," concurred Tommy; "my spelling is a bit rocky."
The Great Man drew a chair to the table.
"You won't miss out anything--will you?" insisted Tommy.
"I shall endeavour, Miss Jane, to give you no cause for complaint,"
gravely he assured her, and sat down to write.
Not till the train began to slacken speed had the Prince finished. Then,
blotting and refolding the paper, he stood up.
"I have added some instructions on the back of the last page," explained
the Prince, "to which you will draw Mr. Hope's particular attention. I
would wish you to promise me, Miss Jane, never again to have recourse to
dangerous acrobatic tricks, not even in the sacred cause of journalism."
"Of course, if you hadn't been so jolly difficult to get at--"
"My fault, I know," agreed the Prince. "There is not the least doubt as
to which sex you belong to. Nevertheless, I want you to promise me.
Come," urged the Prince, "I have done a good deal for you--more than you
know."
"All right," consented Tommy a little sulkily. Tommy hated making
promises, because she always kept them. "I promise."
"There is your Interview." The first Southampton platform lamp shone in
upon the Prince and Tommy as they stood facing one another. The Prince,
who had acquired the reputation, not altogether unjustly, of an
ill-tempered and savage old gentleman, did a strange thing: taking the
little, blood-smeared face between his paws, he kissed it. Tommy always
remembered the smoky flavour of the bristly grey moustache.
"One thing more," said the Prince sternly--"not a word of all this. Don't
open your mouth to speak of it till you are back in Gough Square."
"Do you take me for a mug?" answered Tommy.
They behaved very oddly to Tommy after the Prince had disappeared.
Everybody took a deal of trouble for her, but none of them seemed to know
why they were doing it. They looked at her and went away, and came again
and looked at her. And the more they thought about it, the more puzzled
they became. Some of them asked her questions, but what Tommy really
didn't know, added to what she didn't mean to tell, was so prodigious
that Curiosity itself paled at contemplation of it.
They washed and brushed her up and gave her an excellent supper; and
putting her into a first-class compartment labelled "Reserved," sent her
back to Waterloo, and thence in a cab to Gough Square, where she arrived
about midnight, suffering from a sense of self-importance, traces of
which to this day are still discernible.
Such and thus was the beginning of all things. Tommy, having talked for
half an hour at the rate of two hundred words a minute, had suddenly
dropped her head upon the table, had been aroused with difficulty and
persuaded to go to bed. Peter, in the deep easy-chair before the fire,
sat long into the night. Elizabeth, liking quiet company, purred softly.
Out of the shadows crept to Peter Hope an old forgotten dream--the dream
of a wonderful new Journal, price one penny weekly, of which the Editor
should come to be one Thomas Hope, son of Peter Hope, its honoured
Founder and Originator: a powerful Journal that should supply a long-felt
want, popular, but at the same time elevating--a pleasure to the public,
a profit to its owners. "Do you not remember me?" whispered the Dream.
"We had long talks together. The morning and the noonday pass. The
evening still is ours. The twilight also brings its promise."
Elizabeth stopped purring and looked up surprised. Peter was laughing to
himself.