support. The landlord’s gaze was apologetic but unhelpful. Mr. Lock
looked around among his admirers, but their demeanour had become absent
and constrained. Mr. Lock turned and regarded Mr. Tridge; Mr. Tridge was
wrapped in his own sable meditations. Pettishly, Mr. Lock flung down the
pack of cards and sulked in a corner.
The landlady, having thus suppressed unwelcome propaganda, indulged in a
tight-lipped smile of triumph, and began a rinsing of glasses. The hush
deepened in the room, developing an atmosphere which brought Mr. Lock
back to remembrance of his own insecure position in the world, and this
was rendered still more discomforting by what followed. For an amiable
gentleman in a check coat, after twice clearing his throat, sought to
re-establish light conversation, and asked the landlord whether there was
yet any news of Ted.
“I had a letter from him,” answered the landlord, coming out of a sort of
thoughtful trance.
“Thanking you for all the kindnesses you’ve showed him, I lay,” hazarded
the checkered gentleman.
“No,” returned the landlord, slowly. “’E only asked me to send on after
him a pair of boots he’d left behind for mendin’.”
“Fancy bothering about boots!” marvelled the other. “If my uncle died
and left _me_ a greengrocery shop—”
“And a nice little business, too, by all accounts,” struck in an
individual in a mackintosh.
“Ay, by _his_ accounts,” agreed the landlord. “If half he said was true,
he won’t have to do any more billiard-marking and odd-jobbing.”
“Not while the money lasts, at any rate,” said the man in the mackintosh.
“Have you got anyone to take his place yet?”
The landlord, shaking his head, replied that he had not yet found a
successor to Ted. Billiard-markers, he added, were scarce; people who
desired employment as such were, as a rule, of one or two unsatisfactory
classes, knowing either too little or too much.
Mr. Lock, assimilating this talk, lifted his eyes and peered as it were
through the mists of his troubles. Here, obviously, was a vacancy going,
and one which he was well qualified to fill, for his knowledge of the
billiard table was neither elementary nor academic. A post as a marker
and odd-job man at the “Royal William” appealed with equal force to his
temperament and his talents. He could conceive of no form of employment
more compatible with his desires. He almost groaned with mortification
at the thought that he had allowed a _faux pas_ to ruin his chances of so
delectable a situation.
None the less, he determined to make sure that his opportunity was indeed
irrevocably lost, and, to that end, when the landlady had temporarily
quitted the apartment, he sidled up to the host of the “Royal William,”
and put a blunt inquiry to him.
“No chance whatever!” answered that worthy, regretfully shaking his head.
“You’ll find me just the sort of chap you want,” pleaded Mr. Lock.
“I’ve no doubt of it,” accepted the landlord. “If it was only me what
had the say, you could start to-morrow. I don’t mind admitting straight
to your face that I’ve took to you. You’ve got a civil, well-bred,
amoosin’ way with you. You’d get on like a house afire with the gents in
the billiard-room. But—”
He shook his head again, sighed, and left the ellipsis to carry its own
implication.
“The missis, eh?” said Mr. Lock, sadly.
“The missis,” agreed the landlord.
“I suppose it ’ud be no good my trying to—”
“It ’ud be no good your trying anything!” interrupted the landlord, with
conviction. “You can bet she’s got her knife into you, and you can bet
nothing ’ud please her more than to twist it round like a corkscrew.”
“Well, if I had a job here,” contended Mr. Lock, “she’d have a lot more
chances to twist it.”
“Look here, I’d give you the job if I dared, but I dare not, and that’s
flat and honest,” said the landlord, earnestly. “I daren’t! See?
That’s how it is—I daren’t! But here she comes; _you_ can ask her about
it, if you like.”
The landlady, returning, bent a gaze of extreme displeasure on both Mr.
Lock and her husband at finding them in commune. Mr. Lock, studying her
countenance but the briefest while, turned away.
“I don’t think it matters,” he remarked.
Twenty minutes later the law’s exigency emptied the “Royal William.” The
fresh air outside immediately had a restorative effect on Mr. Lock’s
spirits, giving back to him his normal buoyancy, so that he shed his
worries like a mantle, and became again his gay and debonair self. Mr.
Tridge, however, had come to a slow and obstinate truculency of mood, and
avowed an open antagonism to all mankind. And this divergency of outlook
led to an unfortunate sequel, for, as they made their way back to the
ship, which was only to continue as their home until the formalities of
her sale had been completed, a black cat shot across their path, and Mr.
Lock gleefully hailed its transit as a fortunate omen. “Black cats are
always lucky!” declared Mr. Lock, with elation.
“You’re a liar!” churlishly declared Mr. Tridge.
“But they are!” insisted Mr. Lock.
“And I’ll prove you’re a liar!” cried Mr. Tridge, irately, and forthwith
struck Mr. Lock a grevious blow on the right eye.
“’Ere—steady!” shouted Mr. Lock.
“’Oo are you giving orders to?” bellowed Mr. Tridge, in high passion, and
straightway smote Mr. Lock’s left eye. “_Now_ do you think black cats
are always lucky?”
Mr. Lock, sitting down on a convenient doorstep, pressed his palms to his
eyes, too engrossed in a species of private astronomy to reply to Mr.
Tridge’s question. Mr. Tridge, as one who had creditably sustained the
truth of his assertions, cocked his head proudly and walked on. Mr.
Lock, recovering after a while, followed him with marked caution, nor did
he attempt reprisals. But this magnanimity was less because he knew that
no one would be more surprised and apologetic on the morrow over the
occurrence than Mr. Tridge, than because Mr. Tridge was altogether a
larger and more powerful man than Mr. Lock.
Mr. Tridge, achieving the “Jane Gladys” in grim solitude, made his simple
preparations for slumber, and lay down in his bunk with a sigh of weary
content. He was fast asleep ere Mr. Lock ventured down to the fo’c’sle
and wooed repose.
* * *
“’Strewth!” cried Mr. Tridge, in utter amazement, waking next morning.
Mr. Lock, who had just risen reluctantly to dress, turned an inquiring
gaze on his shipmate.
“_Now_ what is it?” he asked, petulantly.
“’Strewth!” exclaimed Mr. Tridge again, staring incredulously at the
polychromatic setting of Mr. Lock’s eyes. “Peter, you _must_ ’ave been
a-going it last night!” he added, with intense conviction. “My word!”
“Me? No worse than you!” denied Mr. Lock.
“You must ’ave got to scrapping,” surmised Mr. Tridge. “Did you win or
lose?”
“What do you mean?” sourly questioned Mr. Lock. “I never scrapped with no
one. I was—I was imitating canaries. Canaries don’t scrap.”
“’Ow did you get them two awful big black eyes, then?” wonderingly
queried Mr. Tridge.
“Black eyes?” murmured Mr. Lock, perplexed. “Black eyes?”
“Black and red and green and yaller and blue and purple and horange,”
supplemented Mr. Tridge.
Mr. Lock crossed to the little mirror which hung on the shelf.
“So I ’ave!” he said, in blank surprise. “So I ’ave! I thought it was
only the front part of my ’eadache!”
“Two real beauties!” declared Mr. Tridge. “You must ’ave got nasty over
something, Peter. Why didn’t you leave it to me to do your scrapping for
you, like we always does? I shouldn’t ’ave got ’it like that, you can
bet!”
Mr. Lock, disturbed by the discovery, sat down on the edge of his bunk
and shook his head, an action which caused him such discomfort that he
lay down again.
“Can’t you remember ’ow it ’appened, Peter?” asked Mr. Tridge, with
genuine sympathy. “If you can remember the chap _I’ll_ step along and
square up with ’im for you,” he promised.
“I’ve been trying to remember,” said Mr. Lock. “I don’t think it was a
scrap, though. I believe it was a hexaplosion somewhere. I seem to
remember a lot of sparks.”
“Now I come to think of it, I seem to remember a fire or something,”
murmured Mr. Tridge, after mental gropings. “Or was it something to do
with the ’arbour-master?”
The twain lay silent, striving to recollect the cause of the alteration
to Mr. Lock’s countenance, and they were still silently seeking to
establish the origin of the disaster when Mr. Horace Dobb made his
appearance in the fo’c’sle.
“Well, did you ’ave a good time last—” he began, and then broke off at
sight of Mr. Lock’s contused features. “Ah, I see you did!” he ended,
sapiently.
“_Both_ of ’em! That’s what I can’t understand,” mused Mr. Tridge.
“_Both_ of ’em! ’E must ’ave been carrying something in his arms at the
time, that’s the only way I can hexplain it.”
“’Ow did it ’appen, Peter?” asked Mr. Dobb, curiously.
“I can’t remember yet whether it was a man or the hact of providence,”
confessed Mr. Lock. “I’ve got a headache and can’t think clear.”
“Pity,” commented Mr. Dobb. “I’ve come down to see you on a little
matter of business, but if you ain’t equal to—”
“Talking business always clears my ’ead,” said Mr. Lock, eagerly. “Have
you found me a job, then?”
“Found you a road leading to a job,” amended Mr. Dobb. “I can put you on
it, but you must walk up it yourself. ’Ow do you like the hidea of going
around with a milk-cart?”
“Not much,” frankly returned Mr. Lock.
“It’ll do you all right to go on with,” urged Mr. Dobb. “You’ve got to
find something to do, ain’t you?”
“Peter Lock in a milk-cart!” marvelled Mr. Tridge. “A _milk_-cart!
Don’t that just show you what a rum world this is?”
“I shan’t half get chaffed!” foretold Mr. Lock.
“You needn’t keep it longer than it takes you to find a better job,”
pointed out Mr. Dobb. “Meanwhile, you’ll be remaining in Shore’aven
’ere, and we shall all be in touch with each other, like what we’ve
always planned on.”
“But a milk-cart!” protested Mr. Lock. “Now, if it ’ad been a wine and
spirit shop—”
“Think of all the pretty gals you’ll be ’anding in cans to!” recommended
Mr. Dobb. “Everything’s got its bright side.”
“Come to think of it, it ain’t such a bad job,” agreed Mr. Lock,
brightening. “When do I start?”
“You’ve got to get the job first,” Mr. Dobb reminded him. “You’ll ’ave
to play up for it very careful and polite and artful, and that’s why I
thought it was a better chance for you than for Joe, there. There’s a
old geezer, a Mrs. Golightly, what you’ll ’ave to be hextra special
hattentive to. ’Er ’usband runs a grocery shop, and she’s going to start
the dairy business as a side-line in a week or two. You play your cards
right, and the job is yours for the asking. You see, you’re going to do
the old geezer a favour before she knows what you’re after, and that’s
always a big ’elp.”
Mr. Dobb paused and pointed impressively at Mr. Lock.
“You’re one of the finest amytoor animal doctors in England,” he told
him.
“Ho, am I?” said Mr. Lock, casually. “First I’ve heard of it.”
“Same ’ere till a hour ago,” returned Mr. Dobb. “Only I ’appened to be
talking with ’er, and one thing led to another, and then I see you just
’ad to be good at animal doctoring.”
“Why?” asked Mr. Lock.
“Why, because you’re going to cure ’er pet cat of fits for ’er.”
“Am I?” remarked Mr. Lock. “’Ow do I do that?”
“That’s for you to decide,” answered Mr. Dobb, easily. “It’ll be the
beginning of your job in the milk line. It’s lucky she’s got a pet cat
with fits, ain’t it? It’s a black cat, too. Black cats,” he stated,
dogmatically, “are always lucky.”
At mention of these words a swift tremor coursed through Mr. Lock’s
frame, and he sat up in his bunk, staring hard at Mr. Tridge, and
gradually raising a rigid forearm to point accusingly at him. A similar
start of surprise pulsed through Mr. Tridge, and after a long, horrified
stare at Mr. Lock’s damaged optics, he suddenly turned on his mattress
and guiltily drew his blankets over his head. Mr. Dobb, viewing this
by-play in surprise, offered the theory that his friends were rehearsing
for employment as kinema actors.
“I know who done it now!” cried Mr. Lock, bitterly. “And so does he! It
was you talking about black cats, ’Orace, what done it!”
“I done what by talking about black cats?” demanded the mystified Mr.
Dobb.
Mr. Lock irately made the situation clear to Mr. Dobb, who, as soon as he
had regained composure, assumed the role of peacemaker so successfully
that ere long Mr. Tridge was encouraged to emerge again from beneath his
blankets and promise all manner of recompense to Mr. Lock at some future
date when liberality should be more convenient. This understanding
reached, Mr. Dobb returned to the object of his call.
“Soon as ever Mrs. Golightly told me about ’er cat ’aving fits,” said Mr.
Dobb, “I thought at once of you, Peter. Remember that cat you cured of
hiccups at Teignmouth?”
“I _said_ it was cured,” shamelessly corrected Mr. Lock. “I never went
back to see once I’d got the money for it.”
“Anyway, you can _start_ to cure this old geezer’s cat for ’er, can’t
you? You’ve got till next’ Saturday aboard this old boat, ’aven’t you?
Well, suppose you get the cat and bring it ’ere, and keep it with you
till then?”
“I see,” said Mr. Lock, readily. “Then I can take it back to ’er and say
I’m sorry, but I’m leaving the town to find work elsewhere; and what a
pity it is, seeing that the cat’s so much better already under my
treatment.”
“That’s the hidea, Peter!” concurred Mr. Dobb. “The old gal is regularly
wrapped up in that cat. She couldn’t make more fuss of it if she tried.
And ’er ’usband is very fond of it, too. It’s more like a nursery than
anything else when that cat comes into the room, and to ’ear ’em both sit
round hencouraging it to eat its meals! It’s like a baby spending a day
with its grandparents!”
“They’ll be very grateful if I can cure it of fits,” said Mr. Lock,
thoughtfully; “and if I ’aven’t had time enough to do it—”
“They’ll pretty well offer you that job in the milk line without being
asked, simply to keep you near your patient,” prophesied Mr. Dobb. “You
dress yourself now and come along with me, and you’ll see what a simple,
easy affair it is to a smart chap like you.”
“See?” said Mr. Lock severely to Mr. Tridge. “Black cats _are_ always
lucky, after all!”
Half an hour later Mr. Lock, furnished with a very circumstantial story
about a carriage accident to account for the spectacular state of his
features, had the felicity of being introduced to Mrs. Golightly and her
husband by Mr. Horace Dobb. The conventions of etiquette thus fulfilled,
Mr. Dobb came straight to the point of the business in hand.
“Peter’s going to do you a favour and cure that ’ere cat of yours, ain’t
you, Peter?” he observed.
“All being well, yes,” said Mr. Lock, modestly.
“If _you_ can’t cure it, no one can!” gushed Mr. Dobb. “You’re a wonder
at curing animals, Peter, and you knows that’s true. Remember that dog
you cured for the dook?”
“Which one?” asked Mr. Lock, carelessly.
“The—the blood’ound,” answered Mr. Dobb.
“I meant, which dook?” said Mr. Lock.
“The—the one what give you the gold watch and chain,” replied Mr. Dobb.
“Show ’em to Mrs. Golightly, Peter; she’d like to see ’em.”
Mr. Lock’s hand made a movement towards his waistcoat, and then checked
itself. “I forgot,” he said, with a smile. “I left it at the bank in
London, along with all them other testimonials and medals I’ve got for
animal doctoring. A chap what lives a travelling, seafaring life,” he
explained to the lady, “needs to be careful of his property.”
“Yes, indeed,” she assented. “But I wonder you don’t give up the sea and
settle down ashore.”
“So ’e means to one day,” struck in Mr. Dobb. “’E’s going to give up
seafaring and animal-curing, ain’t you, Peter, and settle down quiet and
peaceful ashore?”
“In a nice, quiet, respectable job, when I find one to suit me,” said Mr.
Lock.
“I wonder if you’d—” began the lady, and then paused. “Perhaps you
wouldn’t mind seeing poor Jonathan now?”
Mr. Lock professing readiness to interview his prospective patient, both
Mr. and Mrs. Golightly bustled from the room, making loud and endearing
appeal to the stricken feline to come and be shown to the kind gentleman.
Left alone, Mr. Lock and Mr. Dobb winked very pleasantly at each other.
“It’s as good as yours, that job is, Peter,” said Mr. Dobb. “She nearly
offered it to you just now of ’er own accord. Did you ’ear ’er? You’ve
made a ’it there, Peter, my boy! Keep it up!”
Mrs. Golightly, returning presently with an undistinguished-looking black
cat in her arms, postponed consideration of its condition while she
delivered an affectionate address on the manifold virtues of the animal.
Mr. Lock, after gravely listening to the tale of so much excellence,
plainly enhanced his favour with the good dame by remarking that the cat
reminded him very much of a similar animal, the property of a countess,
which he had cured of sunstroke in two days. He added that the
countess’s gratitude was most touching and substantial.
“Oh, dear!” sighed Mrs. Golightly. “I do ’ope you ain’t going to charge
me very, very much for curing Jonathan! I ain’t a countess, not by no
means.”
“I shouldn’t dream of charging you anything, ma’am,” replied Mr. Lock.
“I’ve already took a great fancy to this cat, for one thing, and for
another, I believe we all ought to do folks good turns whenever we get
the chance.”
He now bent professionally over the cat, felt all the joints in its tail
in a highly technical manner, and then gravely studied its eyes. Mr. and
Mrs. Golightly, watching him, awaited his verdict in breathless suspense.
“He can and shall be cured,” said Mr. Lock. “If,” he added, “I can do it
in the time.”
Within the hour the afflicted animal had taken up temporary residence on
board the “Jane Gladys.” Sundry dainties which had, at Mr. Lock’s
instruction, been secured for the patient’s diet served as an excellent
dinner that day for two impecunious mariners. An indignant black cat
found that “rest and quiet” were terms interpreted on the “Jane Gladys”
by enforced seclusion in a sea-chest while the human occupants of the
fo’c’sle enjoyed a protracted siesta after their meal. Indeed, it was
only when a late tea had restored full energy to Mr. Lock that he
recollected the needs of his patient. A foray in the galley was rewarded
with the discovery of a red herring in a dark corner, and, armed with
this booty, Mr. Lock prepared to inaugurate an altered course of
dietetics for his patient.
Cautiously he raised the lid of the chest, but not cautiously enough; for
the black cat, wearied of solitary confinement, slipped through the
opening, and, easily dodging the convulsive clutch of Mr. Lock and the
outstretched hands of the interested Mr. Tridge, it streaked out of the
fo’c’sle and up on to the deck. Mr. Lock’s ill-timed recriminations of
Mr. Tridge’s clumsiness caused a regrettable delay in pursuit, and when
at last the two sailormen had reached the deck, the black cat had
completely vanished in the darkness.
Frenzied and exhaustive search was made, only to be abandoned in the end
when sundry sportive souls on the wharf took to jocund mimicry of the
enticing calls made by Mr. Lock and his companion. Loudly did Mr. Lock
bewail so inauspicious and swift a termination to his high hopes of the
conduct of a milk-cart.
And moodily did he make his way to Fore Street, there to seek Mr. Dobb in
his home, and tell him of this underhand trick which the cat had played
upon one who had desired to deal benevolently by it.
“Well, it’s no good crying over spilt milk-carts,” pronounced Mr. Dobb,
when his visitor began to sorrow over the wreck of his ambitions.
“You’ve got to be up and doing—that’s all. As long as that cat don’t
turn up at its old ’ome, you’ve always got a chance of finding it again
somewhere.”
“Suppose we don’t find it, though?” asked Mr. Lock.
“Things might be worse even then,” said Mr. Dobb. “After all,” he
hinted, “one black cat is very like another. And they can’t talk and
give things away, can they?”
“No,” agreed Mr. Lock, immensely relieved. “And, besides, a cat that’s
been taken away to be cured of fits ain’t hardly likely to look quite the
same when it comes back again, is it?”
A nod of perfect understanding passed between these two keen tacticians,
and Mr. Dobb promised that he would take care to call frequently at the
residence of the Golightlys to ascertain whether Jonathan was controlled
by homing instincts sufficiently serviceable to lead him back to his
mistress. In that deplorable event, it was decided that action must
depend upon the inspiration of the moment. In the meanwhile, Mr. Lock
expressed his firm intention of securing another black cat from
somewhere, and making its escape a matter of impossibility this time.
And thus it was that Mr. Lock, going wistfully about the environs of the
harbour at a late hour that night at last managed to track down and
capture an animal of the species and colour that he desired. He conveyed
his protesting prisoner swiftly aboard the “Jane Gladys,” and there he
extemporized for it a prison system from which not even a cat provided
with a burglar’s kit and the ability to use it could have escaped.
For three days did Mr. Lock keep close watch and ward over his captive.
Mr. Robb, on reconnoitring duty, was able to tell him that the vanished
Jonathan had not yet put in an appearance at his home, and that the
Golightlys were looking forward with the liveliest emotions of
thankfulness to the moment which should restore to them their pet cured
of its ailment by Mr. Lock’s veterinary skill.
“But s’pose,” put forward Mr. Tridge, one afternoon, in a pessimistic
mood—“s’pose that that there first cat turns up at ’is old ’ome one day
after you’ve got your other cat settled there. It’ll be awkward, won’t
it?”
“Not a bit of it,” vaunted Mr. Lock. “I shall be working at the place by
then, so it’s a ’undred to one that I shall catch sight of it first, and
then there won’t be no fatted calf killed for the returned prodigal, you
can bet. I shall just collar it and shove it in a sack and come down and
have a look to see how the old harbour is getting on.”
“Ah, but s’pose you ain’t on the spot?” persisted Mr. Tridge. “What
’appens then?”
“Why, I shall swear it can’t be their beloved Jonathan, because ’e’d
never ’ave left my sight while I ’ad ’im ’ere, so the new-comer must be a
stray. Oh, I’ll manage them all right, don’t you fret!”
Next morning Mr. Lock arrayed himself in his best, shaved himself to a
miracle of velvet smoothness, and brushed his hair with extraordinary
interest, for he purposed now to restore the pseudo-Jonathan to its
expectant master and mistress, and to bring diplomacy to bear upon the
securing of the coveted post of chaperone to a milk-cart.
“Pity my eyes don’t lose a bit of their colour,” he observed, studying
his reflection in the glass. “They look just as black as they did when
we first ’ad that little dispute, Joe.”
“They look as if you might only ’ave got them last night,” agreed Mr.
Tridge. “’Pon my soul, they makes me feel almost like a bad character
myself, just to be talking to ’em.”
Mr. Lock, recognizing the futility of wishes, dropped the subject and
took up the imprisoned cat. Slipping it into a hamper, he set off up
town with it, and speedily came to the home of the Golightlys.
“’Ere’s you cat, ma’am,” he said to that lady, handing the animal over to
her.
“My, that’s never our Jonathan!” cried the lady.
“Don’t he look well?” asked Mr. Lock, with enthusiasm. “I reckon he’s
more than half cured by now.”
“But—but this is ever so much bigger than our dear old Jonathan,”
objected the lady. “Bigger and—and stouter.”
“That’s the treatment and diet I give ’im,” explained Mr. Lock. “It
always ’as that effect on my patients. It puts on weight and improves
their coat wonderful. Ah, I never grudged him nothing! The best of
everything he’s had, even though I’ve ’ad to go short myself sometimes.”
“Well, he certainly is wonderfully improved,” said the lady, gratefully.
“I shouldn’t ’ardly have ever known ’im. And in that short time, too!
’Owever did you do it, young man?”
“Trade secret,” said Mr. Lock, promptly.
“He—he don’t seem to take much notice of me,” said the lady, a little
disappointedly. “Before he went away, when I used to speak to him, ’e’d
look back at me and mew like a Christian; but now ’e don’t even seem to
like me ’olding ’im.”