Thursday's Serial: "The Brass Bottle" by F. Anstey (in English) - VIII

CHAPTER XVI - A KILLING FROST

Fortunately for Ventimore, the momentary dismay he had felt on finding himself deserted by his unfathomable Jinnee at the very outset of the ceremony passed unnoticed, as the Prime Warden of the Candlestick-makers' Company immediately came to his rescue by briefly introducing him to the Lord Mayor, who, with dignified courtesy, had descended to the lowest step of the dais to receive him.

"Mr. Ventimore," said the Chief Magistrate, cordially, as he pressed Horace's hand, "you must allow me to say that I consider this one of the greatest privileges—if not the greatest privilege—that have fallen to my lot during a term of office in which I have had the honour of welcoming more than the usual number of illustrious visitors."

"My Lord Mayor," said Horace, with absolute sincerity, "you really overwhelm me. I—I only wish I could feel that I had done anything to deserve this—this magnificent compliment!"

"Ah!" replied the Lord Mayor, in a paternally rallying tone. "Modest, my dear sir, I perceive. Like all truly great men! A most admirable trait! Permit me to present you to the Sheriffs."

The Sheriffs appeared highly delighted. Horace shook hands with both of them; indeed, in the flurry of the moment he very nearly offered to do so with the Sword and Mace bearers as well, but their hands were, as it happened, otherwise engaged.

"The actual presentation," said the Lord Mayor, "takes place in the Great Hall, as you are doubtless aware."

"I—I have been given to understand so," said Horace, with a sinking heart—for he had begun to hope that the worst was over.

"But before we adjourn," said his host, "you will let me tempt you to partake of some slight refreshment—just a snack?"

Horace was not hungry, but it occurred to him that he might get through the ceremony with more credit after a glass of champagne; so he accepted the invitation, and was conducted to an extemporised buffet at one end of the Library, where he fortified himself for the impending ordeal with a caviare sandwich and a bumper of the driest champagne in the Corporation cellars.

"They talk of abolishing us," said the Lord Mayor, as he took an anchovy on toast; "but I maintain, Mr. Ventimore—I maintain that we, with our ancient customs, our time-honoured traditions, form a link with the past, which a wise statesman will preserve, if I may employ a somewhat vulgar term, untinkered with."

Horace agreed, remembering a link with a far more ancient past with which he devoutly wished he had refrained from tinkering.

"Talking of ancient customs," the Lord Mayor continued, with an odd blend of pride and apology, "you will shortly have an illustration of our antiquated procedure, which may impress you as quaint."

Horace, feeling absolutely idiotic, murmured that he felt sure it would do that.

"Before presenting you for the freedom, the Prime Warden and five officials of the Candlestick-makers' Company will give their testimony as compurgators in your favour, making oath that you are 'a man of good name and fame,' and that (you will be amused at this, Mr. Ventimore)—that you 'do desire the freedom of this city, whereby to defraud the Queen or the City.' Ha, ha! Curious way of putting it, is it not?"

"Very," said Horace, guiltily, and not a little concerned on the official's account.

"A mere form!" said the Lord Mayor; "but I for one, Mr. Ventimore—I for one should be sorry to see the picturesque old practices die out. To my mind," he added, as he finished a pâté de foie gras sandwich, "the modern impatience to sweep away all the ancient landmarks (whether they be superannuated or not) is one of the most disquieting symptoms of the age. You won't have any more champagne? Then I think we had better be making our way to the Great Hall for the Event of the Day."

"I'm afraid," said Horace, with a sudden consciousness of his incongruously Oriental attire—"I'm afraid this is not quite the sort of dress for such a ceremony. If I had known—"

"Now, don't say another word!" said the Lord Mayor. "Your costume is very nice—very nice indeed, and—and most appropriate, I am sure. But I see the City Marshal is waiting for us to head the procession. Shall we lead the way?"

The band struck up the March of the Priests from Athalie, and Horace, his head in a whirl, walked with his host, followed by the City Lands Committee, the Sheriffs, and other dignitaries, through the Art Gallery and into the Great Hall, where their entrance was heralded by a flourish of trumpets.

The Hall was crowded, and Ventimore found himself the object of a popular demonstration which would have filled him with joy and pride if he could only have felt that he had done anything whatever to justify it, for it was ridiculous to suppose that he had rendered himself a public benefactor by restoring a convicted Jinnee to freedom and society generally.

His only consolation was that the English are a race not given to effusiveness without very good reason, and that before the ceremony was over he would be enabled to gather what were the particular services which had excited such unbounded enthusiasm.

Meanwhile he stood there on the crimson-draped and flower-bedecked dais, bowing repeatedly, and trusting that he did not look so forlornly foolish as he felt. A long shaft of sunlight struck down between the Gothic rafters, and dappled the brown stone walls with patches of gold; the electric lights in the big hooped chandeliers showed pale and feeble against the subdued glow of the stained glass; the air was heavy with the scent of flowers and essences. Then there was a rustle of expectation in the audience, and a pause, in which it seemed to Horace that everybody on the dais was almost as nervous and at a loss what to do next as he was himself. He wished with all his soul that they would hurry the ceremony through, anyhow, and let him go.

At length the proceedings began by a sort of solemn affectation of having merely met there for the ordinary business of the day, which to Horace just then seemed childish in the extreme; it was resolved that "items 1 to 4 on the agenda need not be discussed," which brought them to item 5.

Item 5 was a resolution, read by the Town Clerk, that "the freedom of the City should be presented to Horace Ventimore, Esq., Citizen and Candlestick-maker" (which last Horace was not aware of being, but supposed vaguely that it had been somehow managed while he was at the buffet in the Library), "in recognition of his services"—the resolution ran, and Horace listened with all his ears—"especially in connection with ..." It was most unfortunate—but at this precise point the official was seized with an attack of coughing, in which all was lost but the conclusion of the sentence, "... that have justly entitled him to the gratitude and admiration of his fellow-countrymen."

Then the six compurgators came forward and vouched for Ventimore's fitness to receive the freedom. He had painful doubts whether they altogether understood what a responsibility they were undertaking—but it was too late to warn them and he could only trust that they knew more of their business than he did.

After this the City Chamberlain read him an address, to which Horace listened in resigned bewilderment. The Chamberlain referred to the unanimity and enthusiasm with which the resolution had been carried, and said that it was his pleasing and honourable duty, as the mouthpiece of that ancient City, to address what he described with some inadequacy as "a few words" to one by adding whose name to their roll of freemen the Corporation honoured rather themselves than the recipient of their homage.

It was flattering, but to Horace's ear the phrases sounded excessive, almost fulsome—though, of course, that depended very much on what he had done, which he had still to ascertain. The orator proceeded to read him the "Illustrious List of London's Roll of Fame," a recital which made Horace shiver with apprehension. For what names they were! What glorious deeds they had performed! How was it possible that he—plain Horace Ventimore, a struggling architect who had missed his one great chance—could have achieved (especially without even being aware of it) anything that would not seem ludicrously insignificant by comparison?

He had a morbid fancy that the marble goddesses, or whoever they were, at the base of Nelson's monument opposite, were regarding him with stony disdain and indignation; that the statue of Wellington knew him for an arrant impostor, and averted his head with cold contempt; and that the effigy of Lord Mayor Beckford on the right of the dais would come to life and denounce him in another moment.

"Turning now to your own distinguished services," he suddenly heard the City Chamberlain resuming, "you are probably aware, sir, that it is customary on these occasions to mention specifically the particular merit which had been deemed worthy of civic recognition."

Horace was greatly relieved to hear it, for it struck him as a most sensible and, in his own particular case, essential formality.

"But, on the present occasion, sir," proceeded the speaker, "I feel, as all present must feel, that it would be unnecessary—nay, almost impertinent—were I to weary the public ear by a halting recapitulation of deeds with which it is already so appreciatively familiar." At this he was interrupted by deafening and long-continued applause, at the end of which he continued: "I have only therefore, to greet you in the name of the Corporation, and to offer you the right hand of fellowship as a Freeman, and Citizen, and Candlestick-maker of London."

As he shook hands he presented Horace with a copy of the Oath of Allegiance, intimating that he was to read it aloud. Naturally, Ventimore had not the least objection to swear to be good and true to our Sovereign Lady Queen Victoria, or to be obedient to the Lord Mayor, and warn him of any conspiracies against the Queen's peace which might chance to come under his observation; so he took the oath cheerfully enough, and hoped that this was really the end of the ceremony.

However, to his great chagrin and apprehension, the Lord Mayor rose with the evident intention of making a speech. He said that the conclusion of the City to bestow the highest honour in their gift upon Mr. Horace Ventimore had been—here he hesitated—somewhat hastily arrived at. Personally, he would have liked a longer time to prepare, to make the display less inadequate to, and worthier of, this exceptional occasion. He thought that was the general feeling. (It evidently was, judging from the loud and unanimous cheering). However, for reasons which—for reasons with which they were as well acquainted as himself, the notice had been short. The Corporation had yielded (as they always did, as it would always be their pride and pleasure to yield) to popular pressure which was practically irresistible, and had done the best they could in the limited—he might almost say the unprecedentedly limited—period allowed them. The proudest leaf in Mr. Ventimore's chaplet of laurels to-day was, he would venture to assert, the sight of the extraordinary enthusiasm and assemblage, not only in that noble hall, but in the thoroughfares of this mighty Metropolis. Under the circumstances, this was a marvellous tribute to the admiration and affection which Mr. Ventimore had succeeded in inspiring in the great heart of the people, rich and poor, high and low. He would not detain his hearers any longer; all that remained for him to do was to ask Mr. Ventimore's acceptance of a golden casket containing the roll of freedom, and he felt sure that their distinguished guest, before proceeding to inscribe his name on the register, would oblige them all by some account from his own lips of—of the events in which he had figured so prominently and so creditably.

Horace received the casket mechanically; there was a universal cry of "Speech!" from the audience, to which he replied by shaking his head in helpless deprecation—but in vain; he found himself irresistibly pressed towards the rail in front of the dais, and the roar of applause which greeted him saved him from all necessity of attempting to speak for nearly two minutes.

During that interval he had time to clear his brain and think what he had better do or say in his present unenviable dilemma. For some time past a suspicion had been growing in his mind, until it had now almost swollen into certainty. He felt that, before he compromised himself, or allowed his too generous entertainers to compromise themselves irretrievably, it was absolutely necessary to ascertain his real position, and, to do that, he must make some sort of speech. With this resolve, all his nervousness and embarrassment and indecision melted away; he faced the assembly coolly and gallantly, convinced that his best alternative now lay in perfect candour.

"My Lord Mayor, my lords, ladies, and gentlemen," he began, in a clear voice which penetrated to the farthest gallery and commanded instant attention. "If you expect to hear from me any description of what I've done to be received like this, I'm afraid you will be disappointed. For my own belief is that I've done nothing whatever."

There was a general outcry of "No, no!" at this, and a fervid murmur of protest.

"It's all very well to say 'No, no,'" said Horace, "and I am extremely grateful to you all for the interruption. Still, I can only repeat that I am absolutely unaware of having ever rendered my Country, or this great City, a single service deserving of the slightest acknowledgment. I wish I could feel I had—but the truth is that, if I have, the fact has entirely slipped from my memory."

Again there were murmurs, this time with a certain under-current of irritation; and he could hear the Lord Mayor behind him remarking to the City Chamberlain that this was not at all the kind of speech for the occasion.

"I know what you're thinking," said Horace. "You're thinking this is mock modesty on my part. But it's nothing of the sort. I don't know what I've done—but I presume you are all better informed. Because the Corporation wouldn't have given me that very charming casket—you wouldn't all of you be here like this—unless you were under a strong impression that I'd done something to deserve it." At this there was a fresh outburst of applause. "Just so," said Horace, calmly. "Well, now, will any of you be kind enough to tell me, in a few words, what you suppose I've done?"

There was a dead silence, in which every one looked at his or her neighbour and smiled feebly.

"My Lord Mayor," continued Horace, "I appeal to you to tell me and this distinguished assembly why on earth we're all here!"

The Lord Mayor rose. "I think it sufficient to say," he announced with dignity, "that the Corporation and myself were unanimously of opinion that this distinction should be awarded—for reasons which it is unnecessary and—hum—ha—invidious to enter into here."

"I am sorry," persisted Horace, "but I must press your lordship for those reasons. I have an object.... Will the City Chamberlain oblige me, then?... No? Well, then, the Town Clerk?... No?—it's just as I suspected: none of you can give me your reasons, and shall I tell you why? Because there aren't any.... Now, do bear with me for a moment. I'm quite aware this is very embarrassing for all of you—but remember that it's infinitely more awkward for me! I really cannot accept the freedom of the City under any suspicion of false pretences. It would be a poor reward for your hospitality, and base and unpatriotic into the bargain, to depreciate the value of so great a distinction by permitting it to be conferred unworthily. If, after you've heard what I am going to tell you, you still insist on my accepting such an honour, of course I will not be so ungracious as to refuse it. But I really don't feel that it would be right to inscribe my name on your Roll of Fame without some sort of explanation. If I did, I might, for anything I know, involuntarily be signing the death-warrant of the Corporation!"

There was a breathless hush upon this; the silence grew so intense that to borrow a slightly involved metaphor from a distinguished friend of the writer's, you might have picked up a pin in it! Horace leaned sideways against the rail in an easy attitude, so as to face the Lord Mayor, as well as a portion of his audience.

"Before I go any farther," he said, "will your lordship pardon me if I suggest that it might be as well to direct that all reporters present should immediately withdraw?"

The reporters' table was instantly in a stir of anger, and many of the guests expressed some dissatisfaction. "We, at least," said the Lord Mayor, rising, flushed with annoyance, "have no reason to dread publicity. I decline to make a hole-and-corner affair of this. I shall give no such orders."

"Very well," said Horace, when the chorus of approval had subsided. "My suggestion was made quite as much in the Corporation's interests as mine. I merely thought that, when you all clearly understood how grossly you've been deluded, you might prefer to have the details kept out of the newspapers if possible. But if you particularly want them published over the whole world, why, of course—"

An uproar followed here, under cover of which the Lord Mayor contrived to give orders to have the doors fastened till further directions.

"Don't make this more difficult and disagreeable for me than it is already!" said Horace, as soon as he could obtain a hearing again. "You don't suppose that I should have come here in this Tom-fool's dress, imposing myself on the hospitality of this great City, if I could have helped it! If you've been brought here under false pretences, so have I. If you've been made to look rather foolish, what is your situation to mine? The fact is, I am the victim of a headstrong force which I am utterly unable to control...."

Upon this a fresh uproar arose, and prevented him from continuing for some time. "I only ask for fair play and a patient hearing!" he pleaded. "Give me that, and I will undertake to restore you all to good humour before I have done."

They calmed down at this appeal, and he was able to proceed. "My case is simply this," he said. "A little time ago I happened to go to an auction and buy a large brass bottle...."

For some inexplicable reason his last words roused the audience to absolute frenzy; they would not hear anything about the brass bottle. Every time he attempted to mention it they howled him down, they hissed, they groaned, they shook their fists; the din was positively deafening.

Nor was the demonstration confined to the male portion of the assembly. One lady, indeed, who is a prominent leader in society, but whose name shall not be divulged here, was so carried away by her feelings as to hurl a heavy cut-glass bottle of smelling-salts at Horace's offending head. Fortunately for him, it missed him and only caught one of the officials (Horace was not in a mood to notice details very accurately, but he had a notion that it was the City Remembrancer) somewhere about the region of the watch-pocket.

"Will you hear me out?" Ventimore shouted. "I'm not trifling. I haven't told you yet what was inside the bottle. When I opened it, I found ..."

He got no farther—for, as the words left his lips, he felt himself seized by the collar of his robe and lifted off his feet by an agency he was powerless to resist.

Up and up he was carried, past the great chandeliers, between the carved and gilded rafters, pursued by a universal shriek of dismay and horror. Down below he could see the throng of pale, upturned faces, and hear the wild screams and laughter of several ladies of great distinction in violent hysterics. And the next moment he was in the glass lantern, and the latticed panes gave way like tissue paper as he broke through into the open air, causing the pigeons on the roof to whirr up in a flutter of alarm.

Of course, he knew that it was the Jinnee who was abducting him in this sensational manner, and he was rather relieved than alarmed by Fakrash's summary proceeding, for he seemed, for once, to have hit upon the best way out of a situation that was rapidly becoming impossible.

CHAPTER XVII - HIGH WORDS

Once outside in the open air, the Jinnee "towered" like a pheasant shot through the breast, and Horace closed his eyes with a combined swing-switchback-and-Channel-passage sensation during a flight which apparently continued for hours, although in reality it probably did not occupy more than a very few seconds. His uneasiness was still further increased by his inability to guess where he was being taken to—for he felt instinctively that they were not travelling in the direction of home.

At last he felt himself set down on some hard, firm surface, and ventured to open his eyes once more. When he realised where he actually was, his knees gave way under him, and he was seized with a sudden giddiness that very nearly made him lose his balance. For he found himself standing on a sort of narrow ledge or cornice immediately under the ball at the top of St. Paul's.

Many feet beneath him spread the dull, leaden summit of the dome, its raised ridges stretching, like huge serpents over the curve, beyond which was a glimpse of the green roof of the nave and the two west towers, with their grey columns and urn-topped buttresses and gilded pineapples, which shone ruddily in the sun.

He had an impression of Ludgate Hill and Fleet Street as a deep, winding ravine, steeped in partial shadow; of long sierras of roofs and chimney-pots, showing their sharp outlines above mouse-coloured smoke-wreaths; of the broad, pearl-tinted river, with oily ripples and a golden glitter where the sunligh touched it; of the gleaming slope of mud under the wharves and warehouses on the Surrey side; of barges and steamers moored in black clusters; of a small tug fussing noisily down the river, leaving a broadening arrow-head in its wake.

Cautiously he moved round towards the east, where the houses formed a blurred mosaic of cream, slate, indigo, and dull reds and browns, above which slender rose-flushed spires and towers pierced the haze, stained in countless places by pillars of black, grey, and amber smoke, and lightened by plumes and jets of silvery steam, till all blended by imperceptible gradations into a sky of tenderest gold slashed with translucent blue.

It was a magnificent view, and none the less so because the indistinctness of all beyond a limited radius made the huge City seem not only mystical, but absolutely boundless in extent. But although Ventimore was distinctly conscious of all this, he was scarcely in a state to appreciate its grandeur just then. He was much too concerned with wondering why Fakrash had chosen to plant him up there in so insecure a position, and how he was ever to be rescued from it, since the Jinnee had apparently disappeared.

He was not far off, however, for presently Horace saw him stalk round the narrow cornice with an air of being perfectly at home on it.

"So there you are!" said Ventimore; "I thought you'd deserted me again. What have you brought me up here for?"

"Because I desired to have speech with thee in private," replied the Jinnee.

"We're not likely to be intruded on here, certainly," said Horace. "But isn't it rather exposed, rather public? If we're seen up here, you know, it will cause a decided sensation."

"I have laid a spell on all below that they should not raise their eyes. Be seated, therefore, and hear my words."

Horace lowered himself carefully to a sitting position, so that his legs dangled in space, and Fakrash took a seat by his side. "O, most indiscreet of mankind!" he began, in an aggrieved tone; "thou hast been near the committal of a great blunder, and doing ill to thyself and to me!"

"Well, I do like that!" retorted Horace; "when you let me in for all that freedom of the City business, and then sneaked off, leaving me to get out of it the best way I could, and only came back just as I was about to explain matters, and carried me up through the roof like a sack of flour. Do you consider that tactful on your part?"

"Thou hadst drunk wine and permitted it to creep as far as the place of secrets."

"Only one glass," said Horace; "and I wanted it, I can assure you. I was obliged to make a speech to them, and, thanks to you, I was in such a hole that I saw nothing for it but to tell the truth."

"Veracity, as thou wilt learn," answered the Jinnee, "is not invariably the Ship of Safety. Thou wert about to betray the benefactor who procured for thee such glory and honour as might well cause the gall-bladder of lions to burst with envy!"

"If any lion with the least sense of humour could have witnessed the proceedings," said Ventimore, "he might have burst with laughter—certainly not envy. Good Lord! Fakrash," he cried, in his indignation, "I've never felt such an absolute ass in my whole life! If nothing would satisfy you but my receiving the freedom of the City, you might at least have contrived some decent excuse for it! But you left out the only point there was in the whole thing—and all for what?"

"What doth it signify why the whole populace should come forth to acclaim thee and do thee honour, so long as they did so?" said Fakrash, sullenly. "For the report of thy fame would reach Bedeea-el-Jemal."

"That's just where you're mistaken," said Horace. "If you had not been in too desperate a hurry to make a few inquiries, you would have found out that you were taking all this trouble for nothing."

"How sayest thou?"

"Well, you would have discovered that the Princess is spared all temptation to marry beneath her by the fact that she became the bride of somebody else about thirty centuries ago. She married a mortal, one Seyf-el-Mulook, a King's son, and they've both been dead a considerable time—another obstacle to your plans."

"It is a lie," declared Fakrash.

"If you will take me back to Vincent Square, I shall be happy to show you the evidence in your national records," said Horace. "And you may be glad to know that your old enemy, Mr. Jarjarees, came to a violent end, after a very sporting encounter with a King's daughter, who, though proficient in advanced magic, unfortunately perished herself, poor lady, in the final round."

"I had intended thee to accomplish his downfall," said Fakrash.

"I know," said Horace. "It was most thoughtful of you. But I doubt if I should have done it half as well—and it would have probably cost me an eye, at the very least. It's better as it is."

"And how long hast thou known of these things?"

"Only since last night."

"Since last night? And thou didst not unfold them unto me till this instant?"

"I've had such a busy morning, you see," explained Horace. "There's been no time."

"Silly-bearded fool that I was to bring this misbegotten dog into the august presence of the great Lord Mayor himself (on whom be peace!)," cried the Jinnee.

"I object to being referred to as a misbegotten dog," said Horace, "but with the rest of your remark I entirely concur. I'm afraid the Lord Mayor is very far from being at peace just now." He pointed to the steep roof of the Guildhall, with its dormers and fretted pinnacles, and the slender lantern through which he had so lately made his inglorious exit. "There's the devil of a row going on under that lantern just now, Mr. Fakrash, you may depend upon that. They've locked the doors till they can decide what to do next—which will take them some time. And it's all your fault!"

"It was thy doing. Why didst thou dare to inform the Lord Mayor that he was deceived?"

"Why? Because I thought he ought to know. Because I was bound, particularly after my oath of allegiance, to warn him of any conspiracy against him. Because I was in such a hat. He'll understand all that—he won't blame me for this business."

"It is fortunate," observed the Jinnee, "that I flew away with thee before thou couldst pronounce my name."

"You gave yourself away," said Horace. "They all saw you, you know. You weren't flying so particularly fast. They'll recognise you again. If you will carry off a man from under the Lord Mayor's very nose, and shoot up through the roof like a rocket with him, you can't expect to escape some notice. You see, you happen to be the only unbottled Jinnee in this City."

Fakrash shifted his seat on the cornice. "I have committed no act of disrespect unto the Lord Mayor," he said, "therefore he can have no just cause of anger against me."

Horace perceived that the Jinnee was not altogether at ease, and pushed his advantage accordingly.

"My dear good old friend," he said, "you don't seem to realise yet what an awful thing you've done. For your own mistaken purposes, you have compelled the Chief Magistrate and the Corporation of the greatest City in the world to make themselves hopelessly ridiculous. They'll never hear the last of this affair. Just look at the crowds waiting patiently below there. Look at the flags. Think of that gorgeous conveyance of yours standing outside the Guildhall. Think of the assembly inside—all the most aristocratic, noble, and distinguished personages in the land," continued Horace, piling it on as he proceeded; "all collected for what? To be made fools of by a Jinnee out of a brass bottle!"

"For their own sakes they will preserve silence," said Fakrash, with a gleam of unwonted shrewdness.

"Probably they would hush it up, if they only could," conceded Horace. "But how can they? What are they to say? What plausible explanation can they give? Besides, there's the Press: you don't know what the Press is; but I assure you its power is tremendous—it's simply impossible to keep anything secret from it nowadays. It has eyes and ears everywhere, and a thousand tongues. Five minutes after the doors in that hall are unlocked (and they can't keep them locked much longer) the reporters will be handing in their special descriptions of you and your latest vagaries to their respective journals. Within half an hour bills will be carried through every quarter of London—bills with enormous letters: 'Extraordinary Scene at the Guildhall.' 'Strange End to a Civic Function.' 'Startling Appearance of an Oriental Genie in the City.' 'Abduction of a Guest of the Lord Mayor.' 'Intense Excitement.' 'Full Particulars!' And by that time the story will have flashed round the whole world. 'Keep silence,' indeed! Do you imagine for a moment that the Lord Mayor, or anybody else concerned, however remotely, will ever forget, or be allowed to forget, such an outrageous incident as this? If you do, believe me, you're mistaken."

"Truly, it would be a terrible thing to incur the wrath of the Lord Mayor," said the Jinnee, in troubled accents.

"Awful!" said Horace. "But you seem to have managed it."

"He weareth round his neck a magic jewel, which giveth him dominion over devils—is it not so?"

"You know best," said Horace.

"It was the splendour of that jewel and the majesty of his countenance that rendered me afraid to enter his presence, lest he should recognise me for what I am and command me to obey him, for verily his might is greater even than Suleyman's, and his hand heavier upon such of the Jinn as fall into his power!"

"If that's so," said Horace, "I should strongly advise you to find some way of putting things straight before it's too late—you've no time to lose."

"Thou sayest well," said Fakrash, springing to his feet, and turning his face towards Cheapside. Horace shuffled himself along the ledge in a seated position after the Jinnee, and, looking down between his feet, could just see the tops of the thin and rusty trees in the churchyard, the black and serried swarms of foreshortened people in the street, and the scarlet-rimmed mouths of chimney-pots on the tiled roofs below.

"There is but one remedy I know," said the Jinnee, "and it may be that I have lost power to perform it. Yet will I make the endeavour." And, stretching forth his right hand towards the east, he muttered some kind of command or invocation.

Horace almost fell off the cornice with apprehension of what might follow. Would it be a thunderbolt, a plague, some frightful convulsion of Nature? He felt sure that Fakrash would hesitate at no means, however violent, of burying all traces of his blunder in oblivion, and very little hope that, whatever he did, it would prove anything but some worse indiscretion than his previous performances.

Happily none of these extreme measures seemed to have occurred to the Jinnee, though what followed was strange and striking enough.

For presently, as if in obedience to the Jinnee's weird gesticulations, a lurid belt of fog came rolling up from the direction of the Royal Exchange, swallowing up building after building in its rapid course; one by one the Guildhall, Bow Church, Cheapside itself, and the churchyard disappeared, and Horace, turning his head to the left, saw the murky tide sweeping on westward, blotting out Ludgate Hill, the Strand, Charing Cross, and Westminster—till at last he and Fakrash were alone above a limitless plain of bituminous cloud, the only living beings left, as it seemed, in a blank and silent universe.

"Look again!" said Fakrash, and Horace, looking eastward, saw the spire of Bow Church, rosy once more, the Guildhall standing clear and intact, and the streets and house-tops gradually reappearing. Only the flags, with their unrestful shiver and ripple of colour, had disappeared, and, with them, the waiting crowds and the mounted constables. The ordinary traffic of vans, omnibuses, and cabs was proceeding as though it had never been interrupted—the clank and jingle of harness chains, the cries and whip-crackings of drivers, rose with curious distinctness above the incessant trampling roar which is the ground-swell of the human ocean.

"That cloud which thou sawest," said Fakrash, "hath swept away with it all memory of this affair from the minds of every mortal assembled to do thee honour. See, they go about their several businesses, and all the past incidents are to them as though they had never been."

It was not often that Horace could honestly commend any performance of the Jinnee's, but at this he could not restrain his admiration. "By Jove!" he said, "that certainly gets the Lord Mayor and everybody else out of the mess as neatly as possible. I must say, Mr. Fakrash, it's much the best thing I've seen you do yet."

"Wait," said the Jinnee, "for presently thou shalt see me perform a yet more excellent thing."

There was a most unpleasant green glow in his eyes and a bristle in his thin beard as he spoke, which suddenly made Horace feel uncomfortable. He did not like the look of the Jinnee at all.

"I really think you've done enough for to-day," he said. "And this wind up here is rather searching. I shan't be sorry to find myself on the ground again."

"That," replied the Jinnee, "thou shalt assuredly do before long, O impudent and deceitful wretch!" And he laid a long, lean hand on Horace's shoulder.

"He is put out about something!" thought Ventimore. "But what?" "My dear sir," he said aloud, "I don't understand this tone of yours. What have I done to offend you?"

"Divinely gifted was he who said: 'Beware of losing hearts in consequence of injury, for the bringing them back after flight is difficult.'"

"Excellent!" said Horace. "But I don't quite see the application."

"The application," explained the Jinnee, "is that I am determined to cast thee down from here with my own hand!"

Horace turned faint and dizzy for a moment. Then, by a strong effort of will, he pulled himself together. "Oh, come now," he said, "you don't really mean that, you know. After all your kindness! You're much too good-natured to be capable of anything so atrocious."

"All pity hath been eradicated from my heart," returned Fakrash. "Therefore prepare to die, for thou art presently about to perish in the most unfortunate manner."

Ventimore could not repress a shudder. Hitherto he had never been able to take Fakrash quite seriously, in spite of all his supernatural powers; he had treated him with a half-kindly, half-contemptuous tolerance, as a well-meaning, but hopelessly incompetent, old foozle. That the Jinnee should ever become malevolent towards him had never entered his head till now—and yet he undoubtedly had. How was he to cajole and disarm this formidable being? He must keep cool and act promptly, or he would never see Sylvia again.

As he sat there on the narrow ledge, with a faint and not unpleasant smell of hops saluting his nostrils from some distant brewery, he tried hard to collect his thoughts, but could not. He found himself, instead, idly watching the busy, jostling crowd below, who were all unconscious of the impending drama so high above them. Just over the rim of the dome he could see the opaque white top of a lamp on a shelter, where a pigmy constable stood, directing the traffic.

Would he look up if Horace called for help? Even if he could, what help could he render? All he could do would be to keep the crowd back and send for a covered stretcher. No, he would not dwell on these horrors; he must fix his mind on some way of circumventing Fakrash.

How did the people in "The Arabian Nights" manage? The fisherman, for instance? He persuaded his Jinnee to return to the bottle by pretending to doubt whether he had ever really been inside it.

But Fakrash, though simple enough in some respects, was not quite such a fool as that. Sometimes the Jinn could be mollified and induced to grant a reprieve by being told stories, one inside the other, like a nest of Oriental boxes. Unfortunately Fakrash did not seem in the humour for listening to apologues, and, even if he were, Horace could not think of or improvise any just then. "Besides," he thought, "I can't sit up here telling him anecdotes for ever. I'd almost sooner die!" Still, he remembered that it was generally possible to draw an Arabian Efreet into discussion: they all loved argument, and had a rough conception of justice.

"I think, Mr. Fakrash," he said, "that, in common fairness, I have a right to know what offence I have committed."

"To recite thy misdeeds," replied the Jinnee, "would occupy much time."

"I don't mind that," said Horace, affably. "I can give you as long as you like. I'm in no sort of a hurry."

"With me it is otherwise," retorted Fakrash, making a stride towards him. "Therefore court not life, for thy death hath become unavoidable.'

"Before we part," said Horace, "you won't refuse to answer one or two questions?"

"Didst thou not undertake never to ask any further favour of me? Moreover, it will avail thee nought. For I am positively determined to slay thee."

"I demand it," said Horace, "in the most great name of the Lord Mayor (on whom be peace!)"

It was a desperate shot—but it took effect. The Jinnee quailed visibly.

"Ask, then," he said; "but briefly, for the time groweth short."

Horace determined to make one last appeal to Fakrash's sense of gratitude, since it had always seemed the dominant trait in his character.

"Well," he said, "but for me, wouldn't you be still in that brass bottle?"

"That," replied the Jinnee, "is the very reason why I purpose to destroy thee!"

"Oh!" was all Horace could find to say at this most unlooked-for answer. His sheet anchor, in which he had trusted implicitly, had suddenly dragged—and he was drifting fast to destruction.

"Are there any other questions which thou wouldst ask?" inquired the Jinnee, with grim indulgence; "or wilt thou encounter thy doom without further procrastination?"

Horace was determined not to give in just yet; he had a very bad hand, but he might as well play the game out and trust to luck to gain a stray trick.

"I haven't nearly done yet," he said. "And, remember, you've promised to answer me—in the name of the Lord Mayor!"

"I will answer one other question, and no more," said the Jinnee, in an inflexible tone; and Ventimore realised that his fate would depend upon what he said next.