A Rogue by Compulsion by Victor Bridges (top fiction books of all time TXT) 📖

the train began to move slowly out of the station.

I didn't open my papers at once. For some time I just sat where I was in the corner and stared out contentedly over the passing landscape. There is nothing like prison to broaden one's ideas about pleasure. Up till the time of my trial I had never looked on a railway journey as a particularly fascinating experience; now it seemed to me to be simply chock-full of delightful sensations. The very names of the stations—Totnes, Newton Abbot, Teignmouth—filled me with a sort of curious pleasure: they were part of the world that I had once belonged to—the gay, free, jolly world of work and laughter that I had thought lost to me for ever. I felt so absurdly contented that for a little while I almost forgot about George.

The only stop we made was at Exeter. There were not many people on the platform, and I had just decided that I was not going to be disturbed, when suddenly a fussy-looking little old gentleman emerged from the booking office, followed by a porter carrying his bag. They came straight for my carriage.

The old gentleman reached it first, and puckering up his face, peered in at me through the window. Apparently the inspection was a success.

"This will do," he observed. "Leave my bag on the seat, and go and see that my portmanteau is safely in the van. Then if you come back here I will give you threepence for your trouble."

Dazzled by the prospect, the porter hurried off on his errand, and with a little grunt the old gentleman began to hoist himself in through the door. I put out my hand to assist him.

"Thank you, sir, thank you," he remarked breathlessly. "I am extremely obliged to you, sir."

Then, gathering up his bag, he shuffled along the carriage, and settled himself down in the opposite corner.

I was quite pleased with the prospect of a fellow passenger, unexciting as this particular one promised to be. I have either read or heard it stated that when people first come out of prison they feel so shy and so lost that their chief object is to avoid any sort of society at all. I can only say that in my case this was certainly not true. I wanted to talk to every one: I felt as if whole volumes of conversation had been accumulating inside me during the long speechless months of my imprisonment.

It was the old gentleman, however, who first broke our silence. Lowering his copy of the Times, he looked up at me over the top of his gold-rimmed spectacles.

"I wonder, sir," he said, "whether you would object to having that window closed; I am extremely susceptible to draughts."

"Why, of course not," I replied cheerfully, and suiting my action to my words I jerked up the sash.

This prompt attention to his wishes evidently pleased him; for he thanked me civilly, and then, after a short pause, added some becoming reflection on the subject of the English spring.

It was not exactly an inspiring opening, but I made the most of it. Without appearing intrusive I managed to keep the conversation going, and in a few minutes we were in the middle of a brisk meteorological discussion of the most approved pattern.

"I daresay you find these sudden changes especially trying," commented my companion. Then, with a sort of apology in his voice, he added: "One can hardly help seeing that you have been accustomed to a warmer climate."

I smiled. "I have been out of England," I said, "for some time"; and if this was not true in the letter, I don't think that even George Washington could have found much fault with it in the spirit.

"Indeed, sir, indeed," said the old gentleman. "I envy you, sir. I only wish my own duties permitted me to winter entirely abroad."

"It has its advantages," I admitted, "but in some ways I am quite pleased to be back again."

My companion nodded his head. "For one thing," he said, "one gets terribly behindhand with English news. I find that even the best of the foreign papers are painfully ill-informed."

A sudden mischievous thought came into my head. "I have hardly seen a paper of any kind for a fortnight!" I said. "Is there any particular news? The last interesting thing I saw was about that young fellow's escape from Dartmoor—that young inventor—what was his name?—who was in for murder."

The old gentleman looked up sharply. "Ah! Lyndon," he said, "Neil
Lyndon you mean. He is still at large."

"From what I read of the case," I went on carelessly, "it seems rather difficult to help sympathizing with him—to a certain extent. The man he murdered doesn't appear to have been any great loss to the community."

My companion opened his mouth as if to speak, and then hesitated. "Well, as a matter of fact I am scarcely in a position to discuss the subject," he said courteously. "Perhaps, sir, you are unaware who I am?"

He asked the question with a slight touch of self-conscious dignity, which showed me that in his own opinion at all events he was a person of considerable importance. I looked at him again more carefully. There seemed to be something familiar about his face, but beyond that I was utterly at sea.

"The fact is, I have been so much abroad," I began apologetically—

He cut me short by producing a little silver case from his pocket and handing me one of his cards.

"Permit me, sir," he said indulgently.

I took it and read the following inscription:

RT. HON. SIR GEORGE FRINTON, P.C. The Reform Club.

I remembered him at once. He was a fairly well known politician—an old-fashioned member of the Liberal Party, with whose name I had been more or less acquainted all my life. I had never actually met him in the old days, but I had seen one or two photographs and caricatures of him, and this no doubt explained my vague recollection of his features.

For just a moment I remained silent, struggling against a strong impulse to laugh. There was something delightfully humorous in the thought of my sitting in a first-class carriage exchanging cheerful confidences with a distinguished politician, while Scotland Yard and the Home Office were racking their brains over my disappearance. It seemed such a pity I couldn't hand him back a card of my own just for the fun of watching his face while he read it.

MR. NEIL LYNDON Late of His Majesty's Prison, Princetown.

Collecting myself with an effort, I covered my apparent confusion with a slight bow.

"It was very stupid of me not to have recognized you from your pictures," I said.

This compliment evidently pleased the old boy, for he beamed at me in the most gracious fashion.

"You see now, sir," he said, "why it would be quite impossible for me to discuss the matter in question."

I bowed again. I didn't see in the least, but he spoke as if the point was so obvious that I thought it better to let the subject drop. I could only imagine that he must be holding some official position, the importance of which he probably overrated.

We drifted off into the discussion of one or two other topics; settling down eventually to our respective newspapers. I can't say I followed mine with any keen attention. My brain was too much occupied with my own affairs to allow me to take in very much of what I read. I just noticed that we were engaged in a rather heated discussion with Germany over the future of Servia, and that a well-meaning but short-sighted Anarchist had made an unsuccessful effort to shoot the President of the American Steel Trust.

Of my own affairs I could find no mention, beyond a brief statement to the effect that I was still at liberty. There was not even the usual letter from somebody claiming to have discovered my hiding-place, and for the first time since my escape I began to feel a little neglected. It was evident that as a news topic I was losing something of my first freshness.

The last bit of the journey from Maidenhead onwards seemed to take us an unconscionably long time. A kind of fierce restlessness had begun to get hold of me as we drew nearer to London, and I watched the fields and houses flying past with an impatience I could hardly control.

We rushed through Hanwell and Acton, and then suddenly the huge bulk of Wormwood Scrubbs Prison loomed up in the growing dusk away to the right of the line. It was there that I had served my "separates"—those first ghastly six months of solitary confinement which make even Princetown or Portland a welcome and agreeable change.

At the sight of that poisonous place all the old bitterness welled up in me afresh. For a moment even my freedom seemed to have lost its sweetness, and I sat there with my hands clenched and black resentment in my heart, staring out of those grim unlovely walls. It was lucky for George that he was not with me in the carriage just then, for I think I should have wrung his neck without troubling about any explanations.

I was awakened from these pleasant reflections by a sudden blare of light and noise on each side of the train. I sat up abruptly, with a sort of guilty feeling that I had been on the verge of betraying myself, and letting down the window, found that we were steaming slowly into Paddington Station. In the farther corner of the carriage my distinguished friend Sir George Frinton was beginning to collect his belongings.

I just had time to pull myself together when the train stopped, and out of the waiting line of porters a man stepped forward and flung open the carriage door. He was about to possess himself of my fellow passenger's bag when the latter waved him aside.

"You can attend to this gentleman," he said. "My own servant is somewhere on the platform." Then turning to me, he added courteously: "I wish you good-day, sir. I am pleased to have made your acquaintance. I trust that we shall have the mutual pleasure of meeting again."

I shook hands with him gravely. "I hope we shall," I replied. "It will be a distinction that I shall vastly appreciate."

And of all unconscious prophecies that were ever launched, I fancy this one was about the most accurate.

Preceded by the porter carrying my bag, I crossed the platform and stepped into a waiting taxi.

"Where to, sir?" inquired the man.

I had a sudden wild impulse to say: "Drive me to George," but I checked it just in time.

"You had better drive me slowly along Oxford Street," I said. "I want to stop at one or two shops."

The man started the engine and, climbing back into his seat, set off with a jerk up the slope. I lay back in the corner, and took in a long, deep, exulting breath. I was in London—in London at last—and if those words don't convey to you the kind of savage satisfaction that filled my soul you must be as deficient in imagination as a prison governor.

CHAPTER IX THE MAN WITH THE SCAR

My shopping took me quite a little while. There were a lot of things I wanted to get, and I saw no reason for hurrying—especially as McMurtrie was paying for the taxi. I stopped at Selfridge's and laid in a small but nicely chosen supply of shirts, socks, collars, and other undergarments, and then, drifting slowly on, picked up at intervals some cigars, a couple of pairs of boots, and a presentable Homburg hat.

The question of a suit of clothes was the only problem that offered any real difficulties. Apart from the fact that Savaroff's suit was by no means in its first youth, I had a strong objection to wearing his infernal things a moment longer than I could help. I was determined to have a decently cut suit as soon as possible, but I knew that it would be a week at least before any West End tailor would finish the job. In the meantime I wanted something to go on with, and in my extremity I suddenly remembered a place in Wardour Street where four or five years before I had once hired a costume for a Covent Garden ball.

I told the man to drive me there, and much to my relief found the shop still in existence. There was no difficulty about getting what I wanted. The proprietor had a large