The Victorian Villains Megapack (51 page)

“I tell ye the coon is drunk!” shouted the detective in angry t
ones. “He can’t make small av
me
!”

“I done tole you the trufe,” continued William from a safe distance, his teeth and eyeballs shining in the moonlight.

“Well, where did he go?” asked the conductor. “Did you put him in the drawin’-room?”

“I seen his ticket,” replied William, “an’ he said he wanted to smoke, so he went into the Benvolio, the car behin’.”

“Car behind!” cried McGinnis. “There ain’t no car behind. This here is the last car.”

“Sure,” said the conductor, with a laugh; “we dropped the Benvolio at Selma Junction for repairs. Say, McGinnis, you better have that drink!”

IV

McAllister was awakened by a sense of chill. The compartment was dark, save for the pale light of the moon hanging low over what seemed to be water and the masts of ships, which stole in and picked out sharply the silver buckles on his shoes and the buttons of his doublet. There was no motion, no sound. The train was apparently waiting somewhere, but McAllister could not hear the engine. He put on his ulster and stepped to the door of the c
ar. All the lights had been extinguished and he could hear neither the sound of heavy breathing nor the other customary evidences of the innocent rest of the human animal. He looked across the platform for his own car and found that the train had totally disappeared. The Benvolio was stationary—side-tracked, evidently, on the outskirts of a town, not far from some wharves.

“Jiminy!” thought McAllister, looking at his uncheerful surroundings and his picturesque, if somewhat cool, costume.

For a moment his mental processes refused to answer the heavy draught upon them. Then he turned up his coat-collar, stepped out upon the platform, and lit a cigar. By the light of the match he looked at his watch and saw that it was four o’clock. Overhead the sky glowed with thousands of twinkling stars, and the moon, just touching the sea, made a limpid path of light across the water. At the docks silent ships lay fast asleep. A mile away a clock struck four, intensifying the stillness. It was very beautiful, but very cold, and McAllister shivered as he thought of Wilkins, and Freddy Cabot, and the wedding at twelve o’clock. So far as he knew he might be just outside of Boston—Quincy, or somewhere—yet, somehow, the moon didn’t look as if it were at Quincy.

He jumped down and st
arted along the track. His feet stung as they struck the cinder. His whole body was asleep. It was easy enough to walk in the direction in which the clock had sounded, and this he did. The rails followed the shore for about a hundred yards and then joined the main line. Presently he came in sight of a depot. Every now and then his sword would get between his legs, and this caused him so much annoyance that he took it off and carried it. It was queer how uncomfortable the old style of shoe was when used for walking on a railroad track. His ruffle, too, proved a confounded nuisance, almost preventing a satisfactory adjustment of coat-collar. Finally he untied it and put it in the pocket of his ulster. The cap was not so bad.

The depot had inspired the clubman with distinct hope, but as he approached, it appeared as dark and tenantless as the car behind him. It was impossible to read the name of the station owing to the fact that the sign was too high up for the light of a match to reach it. It was clear that there was nothing to do but to wait for the dawn, and he settled himself in a corner near the express office and tried to forget his discomfort.

He had less time to wait than he had expected. Soon a great clattering of hoofs caused him to climb stiffly to his feet again. Three farmers’ wagons, each drawn b
y a pair of heavy horses, backed in against the platform, and their drivers, throwing down the reins, leaped to the ground. All were smoking pipes and chaffing one another loudly. Then they began to unload huge cans of milk. This looked encouraging. If they were bringing milk at this hour there must be a train—going somewhere. It didn’t matter where to McAllister, if only he could get warm. Presently a faint humming came along the rails, which steadily increased in volume until the approaching train could be distinctly heard.

“Pretty nigh on time,” commented the nearest farmer.

McAllister stepped forward, sword in hand. The farmer involuntarily drew back.

“Wall, I swan!” he remarked, removing his pipe.

“Do you mind telling me,” inquired our friend, “what place this is and where this train goes to?”

“I reckon not,” replied the other. “This is Selma Junction, and this here train is due in New York at five. Who be you?”

“Well,” answered McAllister, “I’m just an humble citizen of New York, forced by circumstances to return to the city as soon as possible.”

“Reckon you’re one o’ them play-actors, bean’t ye?”

“You’ve got it,” retur
ned McAllister. “Fact is, I’ve just been playing Henry VIII—on the road.”

“I’ve heard tell on’t,” commented the rustic. “But I ain’t never seen it. Shakespeare, ain’t it?”

“Yes, Shakespeare,” admitted the clubman.

At this moment the milk-train roared in and the teamsters began passing up their cans. There were no passenger coaches—nothing but freight-cars and a caboose. Toward this our friend made his way. There did not seem to be any conductor, and, without making inquiries, McAllister climbed upon the platform and pushed open the door. If warmth was what he desired he soon found it. The end of the car was roughly fitted with half a dozen bunks, two boxes which served for chairs, and some spittoons. A small cast-iron stove glowed red-hot, but while the place was odoriferous, its temperature was grateful to the shivering McAllister. The car was empty save for a gigantic Irishman sitting fast asleep in the farther corner.

Our hero laid down his sword, threw off his ulster, and hung his cap upon an adjacent hook. In a moment or two the train started again. Still no one came into the caboose. Now daylight began to filter in through the grimy windows. The sun jumped suddenly from behind a ridge and shot a beam into the fa
ce of the sleeper at the other end of the car. Slowly he awoke, yawned, rubbed his eyes, and, catching the glint of silver buttons, gazed stupidly in McAllister’s direction. The random glance gradually gave place to a stare of intense amazement. He wrinkled his brows, and leaned forward, scrutinizing with care every detail of McAllister’s make-up. The train stopped for an instant and a burly brakeman banged open the door and stepped inside. He, too, hung fire, as it were, at the sight of Henry VIII. Then he broke into a loud laugh.

“Who in thunder are
you
?”

Before McAllister could reply McGinnis, with a comprehensive smile, made answer:

“Shure, ’tis only a prisoner I’m after takin’ back to the city!”

* * * *

“Mr. McAllister,” remarked Conville, two hours later, as the three of them sat in the visitors’ room at the club, “I hope you won’t say anything about this. You see, I had no business to put a kid like Ebstein on the job, but I was clean knocked out and had to snatch some sleep. I suppose he thought he was doin’ a big thing when he nailed you for a burglar. But, after all, the only thing that saved Welch was your fallin’ asleep in the Benvolio.”

“My dear Baron,” sympath
etically replied McAllister, who had once more resumed his ordinary attire, “why attribute to chance what is in fact due to intellect? No, I won’t mention our adventure, and if our friend McGinnis—”

“Oh, McGinnis’ll keep his head shut, all right, you bet!” interrupted Barney. “But say, Mr. McAllister, on the level, you’re too good for us. Why don’t you chuck this game and come in out of the rain? You’ll be up against it in the end. Help us to land this feller!”

McAllister took a long pull at his cigar and half-closed his eyes. There was a quizzical look around his mouth that Conville had never seen there before.

“Perhaps I will,” said he softly. “Perhaps I will.”

“Good!” shouted the Baron; “put it there! Now, if you
get
anything, tip us off. You can always catch me at 3100 Spring.”

“Well,” replied the clubman, “don’t forget to drop in here, if you happen to be going by. Some time, on a rainy day perhaps, you might want a nip of something warm.”

But to this the Baron did not respond.

A plun
ge in the tank and a comfortable smoke almost restored McAllister’s customary equanimity. Weddings were a bore, anyway. Then he called for a telegraph b
lank and sent the following:

Was unavoidably detained. Terribly disappointed. If necessary, use Wilkins.

McA.

To which, about noon-time, he received the following reply:

Don’t understand. Wilkins arrived, left clothes and departed. You must have mixed your dates. Wedding tomorrow.

F. C.

THE GOVERNOR-GENERAL’S T
RUNK, by Arthur Train

Taken from
McAllister and His Double
(1905).

I

Mc
Allister was in the tank. His puffing and blowing as he dove and tumbled like a contented, rubicund porpoise, reverberated loudly among the marble pillars of the bath at the club. It was all part of a carefully adjusted and as rigorously followed regimen, for McAllister was a thorough believer in exercise (provided it was moderate), and took it regularly, averring that a fellow couldn’t expect to eat and drink as much as he naturally wanted to unless he kept in some sort of condition, and if he didn’t he would simply get off his peck, that was all. Hence “Chubby” arose regularly at nine-thirty, and wrapping himself in a padded Japanese silk dressing-gown, descended to the tank, where he dove six times and swam around twice, after which he weighed himself and had Tim rub him down. Tim felt a high degree of solicitude for all this procedure, since he was a personal discovery of McAllister’s, and owed his present exalted position entirely to the clubman’s interest, for the latter
had found him at Coney Island earning his daily bread by diving, in the presence of countless multitudes, into a six-foot glass tank, where he seated himself upon the bottom and nonchalantly consumed a banana. McAllister’s delight and enthusiasm at this elevating spectacle had been boundless.

“Wish I could do any one thing as well as that feller dives down and eats that banana!” he had confided to his friend Wainwright. “Sometimes I feel as if my life had been wasted!” The upshot of the whole matter was that Tim had been forthwith engaged as rubber and swimming teacher at the club.

McAllister had just taken his fifth plunge, and was floating lazily toward the steps, when Tim appeared at the door leading into the dressing-rooms and announced that a party wanted to speak to him on the phone, the Lady somebody, evidently a very cantankerous old person, who was in the devil of a hurry, and wouldn’t stand no waitin’.

The clubman turned over, sputtered, touched bottom, and arose dripping to his feet. The “old person” on the wire was clearly his aunt, Lady Lyndhurst, and he knew very much better than to irritate her when she was in one of her tantrums. Still, he couldn’t imagine what she wanted with him at that hour of the morning. She’d been placid enough the evenin
g before when he’d left her after the opera. But ever since she had married Lord Lyndhurst for her second husband ten years before she’d been getting more and more dictatorial.

“Tell her I’m in this beastly tank; awful sorry I can’t speak with her myself, don’cher know, and find out what she wants. And
Tim
—handle her gently—it’s my aunt.”

Tim grinned and winked a comprehending eye. As McAllister hurried into his bath-robe and slippers he wondered more and more why she had rung him up so early. He had intended calling on her after breakfast, any way, but “after breakfast” to McAllister meant in the neighborhood of twelve o’clock, for the meal was always carefully ordered the evening before for half-past ten the next morning, after which came the paper and a long, light Casadora, crop of ’97, which McAllister had bought up entire. Something must be up—that was certain. He could imagine her in her wrapper and curl-papers holding converse with Tim over the wire. The language of his
protégé
might well assist in the process for which the curl-papers were required. There was nobody in the world, in McAllister’s opinion, so queer as his aunt, except his aunt’s husband. The latter was a stout, beefy nobleman of sixty-five, with a walrus-like countenance, an implicit
faith in the perfection of British institutions, and about enough intelligence to drive a watering-cart. He had been rewarded for his unswerving fidelity to party with the post of Governor-General at a small group of islands somewhere near the equator, and had assumed his duties solemnly and ponderously, establishing the Bertillon system of measurements for the seven criminals which his islands supported, and producing quarterly monographs on the flora, fauna, and conchology of his dominion. Just now they were
en route
for England (via Quebec, of course), and were stopping at the Waldorf.

Tim presently reappeared.

“She says you’ve got to hike right down to the hotel as fast as you can. She’s terrible upset. My, ain’t she a tiger?”

“But what’s the bloomin’ row?” exclaimed McAllister.

Tim looked round cautiously and lowered his voice.

“The Lyndhurst Jewels has been stole!” said he.

II

The Lyndhurst Jewels stolen! No wonder Aunt Sophia had seemed peevish, for they were the treasured heirlooms of her husband’s family, cherished and guarded by her
with anxious eye. McAllister had always said the old man was an ass to go lugging ’em off down among the mangoes and land-crabs, but the Governor-General liked to have his lady appear in style at Government House, and took much innocent pleasure in astonishing the natives by the splendor of her adornment. The jewelry, however, was the source of unending annoyance to himself, Sophia, and everybody else, for it was always getting lost, and burglar scares occurred with regularity at the islands. It had been still intact, however, on their arrival in New York.

The clubman found his uncle and aunt sitting dejectedly at the breakfast-table in the Diplomatic Suite.

The atmosphere of gloom struck a cold chill to our friend’s centre of vivacity. There were also evidences of a domestic misunderstanding. His aunt fidgeted nervously, and his uncle evaded McAllister’s eye as they responded half-heartedly to his cheerful salutation. That the matter was serious was obvious. Clearly this time the jewels must be really gone. In addition, both the Governor-General and his lady kept looking over their shoulders fearfully, as if dreading the momentary assault of some assassin. McAllister inquired what the jolly mess was, incidentally suggesting that their hurry-call had dep
rived him of any attempt at breakfast. His hint, however, fell on barren ground.

“That fool Morton has packed all the jewelry in the big Vuitton!” exclaimed his uncle, nervously jabbing his spoon into a grape-fruit. “To say the least, it was excessively careless of him, for he knows perfectly well that we always carry it in the morocco hand-bag, and never allow it out of our sight.” The Governor-General paused, and took a sip of coffee.

“Well,” said McAllister, rather impatiently, “why don’t you have him unpack it, then?” He couldn’t for the life of him see why they made such a row about a thing of that sort. It was clear enough that they were both more than half mad.

“Ah, that’s the point! It was sent to the station with the rest of the luggage last evening. Heaven knows it may all have been stolen by this time! Think of it, McAllister! The Lyndhurst Jewels, secured merely by a miserable brass check with a number on it—and the railroad liable by express contract only to the extent of one hundred dollars!” Before Uncle Basil had attained his present eminence he had been called to the bar, and his book on “Flotsam and Jetsam” is still an authority in those regions to which later works have not penetrated. “You see
we’re leaving at three this afternoon, but why send it all so early unless
for a purpose
?” Lord Lyndhurst nodded conclusively. He had the air of one who had divined something.

Still Chubby failed to see the connection. Someone, a valet evidently, had packed the jewelry in the wrong place, and then sent the load off a little ahead of time. What of it? He recalled vividly an occasion when the jewels had been stuffed by mistake into the soiled-clothes basket, but had turned up safe enough at the end of the trip.

“If that is all,” replied McAllister, “all you have to do is to send your man over to the station and have the trunk brought back. Send the fellow who packed the trunk—this Morton—whoever he is.”

“No,” said his uncle, studiously knocking in the end of a boiled egg. “There are reasons. I wish you would go, instead. The fact is I don’t wish Morton to leave the rooms this morning; I—I need him.” Lord Lyndhurst again evaded the clubman’s inquiring glance, and eyed the egg in an embarrassed fashion.

McAllister laughed. “I guess your jewelry’s all right,” said he cheerfully. “Certainly I’ll go. Don’t worry. I’ll have the trunk and the jewels back here inside of fifty minutes
. Who’s Morton, anyhow?”

“My valet,” replied Lord Lyndhurst, lowering his voice, and looking over his shoulder. “You wouldn’t recall him. I engaged the man at Kingston on the way out. As a servant I have had absolutely no fault to find at all. You know it’s very hard to get a good man to go to the Tropics, but Morton has seemed perfectly contented. Up to the present time I haven’t had the slightest reason to suspect his honesty!”

“Well, I don’t see that you have any now,” said McAllister. “I guess I’ll start along. I haven’t had anythin’ to eat yet. Have you the check?”

Uncle Basil gingerly handed him the bit of brass.

“I secured it from Morton,” he remarked, attacking the egg viciously.

“Secured it?” exclaimed McAllister.

The Governor-General nodded ambiguously.

Aunt Sophia during the course of the recital had become almost hysterical, and now sat wringing her hands in the greatest agitation. Suddenly she broke forth:

“I told Basil he had been too hasty! But he would have it that there was nothing else to do! Oh, dear! Oh, dear! Why don’t you tell him what you’ve done?”

“What in thunder
have
you done?” asked McAllister, now convinced beyond per
adventure that his uncle was a candidate for the nearest insane asylum.

Lord Lyndhurst became very red, stammered, and jerked his thumb over his shoulder.

“Yes, secured it! Morton, if you must know it, is locked in the clothes-closet. I locked him!”

“He’s in
there
!” suddenly wailed Aunt Sophia. “Basil put him in! And now the jewelry’s no one knows where, and there’s a man in the room, and I’m afraid to stay and Basil’s afraid to go for fear he may get out, and——”

She was interrupted by a smothered voice that came from within the closet. McAllister was startled, for there was something faintly, vaguely familiar about it.

“It’s a bloomin’ houtrage, it is! Look ’ere, sir, I’ll ’ave you to hunderstand that I gives notice at once, sir, ’ere and now, sir! It’s a great hindignity you are a-puttin’ me to, sir! Won’t you let me hout, sir?” The voice ceased momentarily.

“Isn’t it awful!” exclaimed Aunt Sophia. “He’s been like that for over an hour!”

“Yes!” added Uncle Basil. “At times he’s been actually abusive.” But McAllister was lost in an effort to recall the hazy past. Where had he heard that voice before?

“’Ang it, sir! Won’t you let me hout
, sir,” continued Morton. “I’m stiflin’ in ’ere, an’ I thinks there’s a rat, sir. O Lawd! Let me hout!”

McAllister jumped to his feet. Of course he recognized the voice! Could he ever forget it? Had anyone ever said “O Lawd!” in quite the same way as the majestic Wilkins? It could be no other! By George, the old man wasn’t such a fool
after
all! And the jewels! He smote his fist upon the table, while his uncle and aunt gazed at him apprehensively. There was no use exciting their fears, however. It was all plain to him, now. The clever dog! Well, the first thing was to see what had become of the jewels.

“Damn!” came in vigorous tones from the closet, as Wilkins endeavored to assert himself. “It’s a bloomin’ houtrage, it is! I’ll ’ave you arrested for hassault an’ bat’ry, I will, if you
are
a guv’nor! Let me
hout
, I say!”

III

McAllister lost no time in getting to the Grand Central Station. He was looking for a big Vuitton trunk, and he wanted to find it quick. For this purpose he enlisted the services of a burly young porter, who, for the consideration of a half-dollar, piloted the clubman through
the crowded alleys of the outgoing baggage-room, until they came upon the familiar collection of Lord Lyndhurst’s paraphernalia of travel. Eagerly he recognized the luggage of his uncle’s official household. There were his boot-boxes, his hat-boxes, his portable desk, his dumb-bells, his bath-tub, his medicine chest, the secretary’s trunk, the typewriter in its case; there were his aunt’s basket trunks, and—yes—there was the big Vuitton. McAllister heaved a sigh of relief. The next thing was to get it back to the hotel as fast as possible.

“That’s it,” said he to the porter. “Heave it out!” They were standing in a little open space some distance from the entrance. The big Vuitton lay at one side, and about it a row of other trunks roughly in a semicircle. The porter made but one step in the desired direction, then jumped as if he had seen a ghost, for a big basket trunk, standing alone upon its end apart, suddenly shook violently, its lock clicked, the cover swung open, and out jumped a slender, sharp-featured young man with a black mustache. It was Barney Conville, although at first McAllister failed to recognize him.

“Look here you! Don’t touch that trunk!” he exclaimed. Then he perceived McAllister, and a look of intense disgust overspread his face.

“It’s the Baron!” ejaculated McAlliste
r. “Now what the devil do you suppose he’s been doin’ in that trunk? Howd’y’, Baron,” he added pleasantly, holding out his hand. “Hardly expected to see you here. Do you take your rest that way?” pointing to the trunk from which Conville had emerged.

The detective eyed him with disapproval.

“Say,” he remarked, disdainfully, “you give me a pain—always buttin’ in an’ spoilin’ everythin’! This here is a
plant
. I’m waitin’ fer a thief—Jerry, the Oyster. They’re goin’ to try an’ lift that big striped trunk over there. It belongs to an old party up to the Waldorf. He’s a diplomatico.”

“He’s my uncle!” cried McAllister.

“Your
aunt
!” snorted Barney.

“But I want to take that trunk back with me.”

“On the level?”

“Sure!”

“Can’t help it! This is an important job. The Oyster’s the cleverest thief in the business. Works in with all the butlers and valets. Why he’s got away with more’n three thousand pieces of baggage. He’s the——”