No More Learning

By Gad, they'll have to sweat for it
if I come through this business alive! "

In the evening Torpenhow was able to announce to his friend that
the Central Southern Agency was willing to take him on trial, paying
expenses for three months. "And, by the way, what's your name? " said
Torpenhow.

"Heldar. Do they give me a free hand? "

"They've taken you on chance. You must justify the choice. You'd better
stick to me. I'm going up-country with a column, and I'll do what I can
for you. Give me some of your sketches taken here, and I'll send
'em along. " To himself he said, "That's the best bargain the Central
Southern has ever made; and they got me cheaply enough. "

So it came to pass that, after some purchase of horse-flesh and
arrangements financial and political, Dick was made free of the New
and Honourable Fraternity of war correspondents, who all possess the
inalienable right of doing as much work as they can and getting as much
for it as Providence and their owners shall please. To these things are
added in time, if the brother be worthy, the power of glib speech that
neither man nor woman can resist when a meal or a bed is in question,
the eye of a horse-cope, the skill of a cook, the constitution of a
bullock, the digestion of an ostrich, and an infinite adaptability to
all circumstances. But many die before they attain to this degree, and
the past-masters in the craft appear for the most part in dress-clothes
when they are in England, and thus their glory is hidden from the
multitude.

Dick followed Torpenhow wherever the latter's fancy chose to lead him,
and between the two they managed to accomplish some work that almost
satisfied themselves. It was not an easy life in any way, and under its
influence the two were drawn very closely together, for they ate from
the same dish, they shared the same water-bottle, and, most binding tie
of all, their mails went off together. It was Dick who managed to make
gloriously drunk a telegraph-clerk in a palm hut far beyond the Second
Cataract, and, while the man lay in bliss on the floor, possessed
himself of some laboriously acquired exclusive information, forwarded
by a confiding correspondent of an opposition syndicate, made a careful
duplicate of the matter, and brought the result to Torpenhow, who said
that all was fair in love or war correspondence, and built an excellent
descriptive article from his rival's riotous waste of words. It was
Torpenhow who--but the tale of their adventures, together and apart,
from Philae to the waste wilderness of Herawi and Muella, would fill
many books. They had been penned into a square side by side, in deadly
fear of being shot by over-excited soldiers; they had fought with
baggage-camels in the chill dawn; they had jogged along in silence
under blinding sun on indefatigable little Egyptian horses; and they had
floundered on the shallows of the Nile when the whale-boat in which
they had found a berth chose to hit a hidden rock and rip out half her
bottom-planks.

Now they were sitting on the sand-bank, and the whale-boats were
bringing up the remainder of the column.

"Yes," said Torpenhow, as he put the last rude stitches into his
over-long-neglected gear, "it has been a beautiful business. "

"The patch or the campaign? " said Dick. "Don't think much of either,
myself. "

"You want the Euryalus brought up above the Third Cataract, don't you?
and eighty-one-ton guns at Jakdul? Now, I'm quite satisfied with my
breeches. " He turned round gravely to exhibit himself, after the manner
of a clown.

"It's very pretty. Specially the lettering on the sack. G. B. T.
Government Bullock Train. That's a sack from India. "

"It's my initials,--Gilbert Belling Torpenhow. I stole the cloth on
purpose. What the mischief are the camel-corps doing yonder? " Torpenhow
shaded his eyes and looked across the scrub-strewn gravel.

A bugle blew furiously, and the men on the bank hurried to their arms
and accoutrements.

"'Pisan soldiery surprised while bathing,'" remarked Dick, calmly.

"D'you remember the picture? It's by Michael Angelo; all beginners copy
it. That scrub's alive with enemy. "

The camel-corps on the bank yelled to the infantry to come to them, and
a hoarse shouting down the river showed that the remainder of the
column had wind of the trouble and was hastening to take share in it.
As swiftly as a reach of still water is crisped by the wind, the
rock-strewn ridges and scrub-topped hills were troubled and alive with
armed men.

Mercifully, it occurred to these to stand far off for a time, to shout
and gesticulate joyously. One man even delivered himself of a long
story. The camel-corps did not fire. They were only too glad of a little
breathing-space, until some sort of square could be formed. The men on
the sand-bank ran to their side; and the whale-boats, as they toiled up
within shouting distance, were thrust into the nearest bank and emptied
of all save the sick and a few men to guard them. The Arab orator ceased
his outcries, and his friends howled.

"They look like the Mahdi's men," said Torpenhow, elbowing himself
into the crush of the square; "but what thousands of 'em there are! The
tribes hereabout aren't against us, I know. "

"Then the Mahdi's taken another town," said Dick, "and set all these
yelping devils free to show us up. Lend us your glass. "

"Our scouts should have told us of this. We've been trapped," said a
subaltern. "Aren't the camel guns ever going to begin? Hurry up, you
men! "

There was no need of any order. The men flung themselves panting against
the sides of the square, for they had good reason to know that whoso
was left outside when the fighting began would very probably die in
an extremely unpleasant fashion. The little hundred-and-fifty-pound
camel-guns posted at one corner of the square opened the ball as the
square moved forward by its right to get possession of a knoll of rising
ground. All had fought in this manner many times before, and there
was no novelty in the entertainment; always the same hot and stifling
formation, the smell of dust and leather, the same boltlike rush of
the enemy, the same pressure on the weakest side, the few minutes of
hand-to-hand scuffle, and then the silence of the desert, broken only
by the yells of those whom their handful of cavalry attempted to purse.
They had become careless. The camel-guns spoke at intervals, and the
square slouched forward amid the protesting of the camels. Then came the
attack of three thousand men who had not learned from books that it is
impossible for troops in close order to attack against breech-loading
fire.

A few dropping shots heralded their approach, and a few horsemen led,
but the bulk of the force was naked humanity, mad with rage, and armed
with the spear and the sword. The instinct of the desert, where there
is always much war, told them that the right flank of the square was the
weakest, for they swung clear of the front. The camel-guns shelled them
as they passed and opened for an instant lanes through their midst, most
like those quick-closing vistas in a Kentish hop-garden seen when the
train races by at full speed; and the infantry fire, held till the
opportune moment, dropped them in close-packing hundreds. No civilised
troops in the world could have endured the hell through which they came,
the living leaping high to avoid the dying who clutched at their heels,
the wounded cursing and staggering forward, till they fell--a torrent
black as the sliding water above a mill-dam--full on the right flank of
the square.

Then the line of the dusty troops and the faint blue desert sky overhead
went out in rolling smoke, and the little stones on the heated ground
and the tinder-dry clumps of scrub became matters of surpassing
interest, for men measured their agonised retreat and recovery by these
things, counting mechanically and hewing their way back to chosen pebble
and branch. There was no semblance of any concerted fighting. For aught
the men knew, the enemy might be attempting all four sides of the square
at once. Their business was to destroy what lay in front of them, to
bayonet in the back those who passed over them, and, dying, to drag
down the slayer till he could be knocked on the head by some avenging
gun-butt.

Dick waited with Torpenhow and a young doctor till the stress grew
unendurable. It was hopeless to attend to the wounded till the attack
was repulsed, so the three moved forward gingerly towards the weakest
side of the square. There was a rush from without, the short hough-hough
of the stabbing spears, and a man on a horse, followed by thirty or
forty others, dashed through, yelling and hacking. The right flank of
the square sucked in after them, and the other sides sent help. The
wounded, who knew that they had but a few hours more to live, caught at
the enemy's feet and brought them down, or, staggering into a discarded
rifle, fired blindly into the scuffle that raged in the centre of the
square.

Dick was conscious that somebody had cut him violently across his
helmet, that he had fired his revolver into a black, foam-flecked face
which forthwith ceased to bear any resemblance to a face, and that
Torpenhow had gone down under an Arab whom he had tried to "collar low,"
and was turning over and over with his captive, feeling for the man's
eyes. The doctor jabbed at a venture with a bayonet, and a helmetless
soldier fired over Dick's shoulder: the flying grains of powder stung
his cheek. It was to Torpenhow that Dick turned by instinct. The
representative of the Central Southern Syndicate had shaken himself
clear of his enemy, and rose, wiping his thumb on his trousers. The
Arab, both hands to his forehead, screamed aloud, then snatched up his
spear and rushed at Torpenhow, who was panting under shelter of Dick's
revolver. Dick fired twice, and the man dropped limply. His upturned
face lacked one eye. The musketry-fire redoubled, but cheers mingled
with it. The rush had failed and the enemy were flying. If the heart of
the square were shambles, the ground beyond was a butcher's shop. Dick
thrust his way forward between the maddened men. The remnant of the
enemy were retiring, as the few--the very few--English cavalry rode down
the laggards.

Beyond the lines of the dead, a broad blood-stained Arab spear cast
aside in the retreat lay across a stump of scrub, and beyond this again
the illimitable dark levels of the desert. The sun caught the steel
and turned it into a red disc. Some one behind him was saying, "Ah,
get away, you brute! " Dick raised his revolver and pointed towards the
desert. His eye was held by the red splash in the distance, and the
clamour about him seemed to die down to a very far-away whisper, like
the whisper of a level sea. There was the revolver and the red light.
. . . and the voice of some one scaring something away, exactly as had
fallen somewhere before,--a darkness that stung. He fired at random, and
the bullet went out across the desert as he muttered, "Spoilt my aim.
There aren't any more cartridges. We shall have to run home. " He put his
hand to his head and brought it away covered with blood.

"Old man, you're cut rather badly," said Torpenhow. "I owe you something
for this business. Thanks. Stand up! I say, you can't be ill here. "

Throughout the night, when the troops were encamped by the whale-boats,
a black figure danced in the strong moonlight on the sand-bar and
shouted that Khartoum the accursed one was dead,--was dead,--was
dead,--that two steamers were rock-staked on the Nile outside the city,
and that of all their crews there remained not one; and Khartoum was
dead,--was dead,--was dead! But Torpenhow took no heed. He was watching
Dick, who called aloud to the restless Nile for Maisie,--and again
Maisie! "Behold a phenomenon," said Torpenhow, rearranging the blanket.
"Here is a man, presumably human, who mentions the name of one woman
only. And I've seen a good deal of delirium, too. --Dick, here's some
fizzy drink. "

"Thank you, Maisie," said Dick.



CHAPTER III

So he thinks he shall take to the sea again
For one more cruise with his buccaneers,
To singe the beard of the King of Spain,
And capture another Dean of Jaen
And sell him in Algiers.
--Dutch Picture. Longfellow

THE SOUDAN campaign and Dick's broken head had been some months ended
and mended, and the Central Southern Syndicate had paid Dick a certain
sum on account for work done, which work they were careful to assure him
was not altogether up to their standard. Dick heaved the letter into
the Nile at Cairo, cashed the draft in the same town, and bade a warm
farewell to Torpenhow at the station.

"I am going to lie up for a while and rest," said Torpenhow. "I don't
know where I shall live in London, but if God brings us to meet, we
shall meet. Are you staying here on the off-chance of another row? There
will be none till the Southern Soudan is reoccupied by our troops. Mark
that. Goodbye; bless you; come back when your money's spent; and give me
your address. "

Dick loitered in Cairo, Alexandria, Ismailia, and Port Said,--especially
Port Said. There is iniquity in many parts of the world, and vice in
all, but the concentrated essence of all the iniquities and all the
vices in all the continents finds itself at Port Said. And through the
heart of that sand-bordered hell, where the mirage flickers day long
above the Bitter Lake, move, if you will only wait, most of the men and
women you have known in this life. Dick established himself in quarters
more riotous than respectable. He spent his evenings on the quay, and
boarded many ships, and saw very many friends,--gracious Englishwomen
with whom he had talked not too wisely in the veranda of Shepherd's
Hotel, hurrying war correspondents, skippers of the contract troop-ships
employed in the campaign, army officers by the score, and others of less
reputable trades.

He had choice of all the races of the East and West for studies, and
the advantage of seeing his subjects under the influence of strong
excitement, at the gaming-tables, saloons, dancing-hells, and elsewhere.
For recreation there was the straight vista of the Canal, the blazing
sands, the procession of shipping, and the white hospitals where the
English soldiers lay. He strove to set down in black and white and
colour all that Providence sent him, and when that supply was ended
sought about for fresh material. It was a fascinating employment, but
it ran away with his money, and he had drawn in advance the hundred and
twenty pounds to which he was entitled yearly. "Now I shall have to work
and starve! " thought he, and was addressing himself to this new fate
when a mysterious telegram arrived from Torpenhow in England, which
said, "Come back, quick; you have caught on. Come. "

A large smile overspread his face. "So soon! that's a good hearing,"
said he to himself. "There will be an orgy tonight. I'll stand or fall
by my luck. Faith, it's time it came! " He deposited half of his funds
in the hands of his well-known friends Monsieur and Madame Binat, and
ordered himself a Zanzibar dance of the finest. Monsieur Binat was
shaking with drink, but Madame smiles sympathetically--"Monsieur needs
a chair, of course, and of course Monsieur will sketch; Monsieur amuses
himself strangely. "

Binat raised a blue-white face from a cot in the inner room. "I
understand," he quavered. "We all know Monsieur. Monsieur is an artist,
as I have been. " Dick nodded. "In the end," said Binat, with gravity,
"Monsieur will descend alive into hell, as I have descended. " And he
laughed.

"You must come to the dance, too," said Dick; "I shall want you. "

"For my face? I knew it would be so. For my face? My God! and for my
degradation so tremendous! I will not. Take him away. He is a devil.
Or at least do thou, Celeste, demand of him more. " The excellent Binat
began to kick and scream.

"All things are for sale in Port Said," said Madame. "If my husband
comes it will be so much more. Eh, how you call 'alf a sovereign. "

The money was paid, and the mad dance was held at night in a walled courtyard
at the back of Madame Binat's house. The lady herself, in faded mauve
silk always about to slide from her yellow shoulders, played the piano,
and to the tin-pot music of a Western waltz the naked Zanzibari girls
danced furiously by the light of kerosene lamps. Binat sat upon a chair
and stared with eyes that saw nothing, till the whirl of the dance and
the clang of the rattling piano stole into the drink that took the place
of blood in his veins, and his face glistened. Dick took him by the chin
brutally and turned that face to the light. Madame Binat looked over her
shoulder and smiled with many teeth. Dick leaned against the wall and
sketched for an hour, till the kerosene lamps began to smell, and the
girls threw themselves panting on the hard-beaten ground. Then he shut
his book with a snap and moved away, Binat plucking feebly at his elbow.
"Show me," he whimpered. "I too was once an artist, even I! " Dick showed
him the rough sketch. "Am I that? " he screamed. "Will you take that away
with you and show all the world that it is I,--Binat? " He moaned and
wept.

"Monsieur has paid for all," said Madame. "To the pleasure of seeing
Monsieur again. "

The courtyard gate shut, and Dick hurried up the sandy street to the
nearest gambling-hell, where he was well known. "If the luck holds, it's
an omen; if I lose, I must stay here. " He placed his money picturesquely
about the board, hardly daring to look at what he did. The luck held.

Three turns of the wheel left him richer by twenty pounds, and he went
down to the shipping to make friends with the captain of a decayed
cargo-steamer, who landed him in London with fewer pounds in his pocket
than he cared to think about.

A thin gray fog hung over the city, and the streets were very cold; for
summer was in England.

"It's a cheerful wilderness, and it hasn't the knack of altering much,"
Dick thought, as he tramped from the Docks westward. "Now, what must I
do? "

The packed houses gave no answer. Dick looked down the long lightless
streets and at the appalling rush of traffic. "Oh, you rabbit-hutches! "
said he, addressing a row of highly respectable semi-detached
residences. "Do you know what you've got to do later on?
You have to
supply me with men-servants and maid-servants,"--here he smacked his
lips,--"and the peculiar treasure of kings. Meantime I'll clothes and
boots, and presently I will return and trample on you. " He stepped
forward energetically; he saw that one of his shoes was burst at the
side. As he stooped to make investigations, a man jostled him into the
gutter. "All right," he said. "That's another nick in the score. I'll
jostle you later on. "

Good clothes and boots are not cheap, and Dick left his last shop with
the certainty that he would be respectably arrayed for a time, but with
only fifty shillings in his pocket. He returned to streets by the Docks,
and lodged himself in one room, where the sheets on the bed were almost
audibly marked in case of theft, and where nobody seemed to go to bed at
all. When his clothes arrived he sought the Central Southern Syndicate
for Torpenhow's address, and got it, with the intimation that there was
still some money waiting for him.

"How much? " said Dick, as one who habitually dealt in millions.

"Between thirty and forty pounds. If it would be any convenience to
you, of course we could let you have it at once; but we usually settle
accounts monthly. "

"If I show that I want anything now, I'm lost," he said to himself. "All
I need I'll take later on. " Then, aloud, "It's hardly worth while; and
I'm going to the country for a month, too. Wait till I come back, and
I'll see about it. "

"But we trust, Mr. Heldar, that you do not intend to sever your
connection with us? "

Dick's business in life was the study of faces, and he watched the speaker
keenly. "That man means something," he said. "I'll do no business till
I've seen Torpenhow. There's a big deal coming. " So he departed, making
no promises, to his one little room by the Docks. And that day was
the seventh of the month, and that month, he reckoned with awful
distinctness, had thirty-one days in it! It is not easy for a man of
catholic tastes and healthy appetites to exist for twenty-four days on
fifty shillings. Nor is it cheering to begin the experiment alone in
all the loneliness of London. Dick paid seven shillings a week for his
lodging, which left him rather less than a shilling a day for food and
drink. Naturally, his first purchase was of the materials of his craft;
he had been without them too long. Half a day's investigations and
comparison brought him to the conclusion that sausages and mashed
potatoes, twopence a plate, were the best food. Now, sausages once or
twice a week for breakfast are not unpleasant. As lunch, even, with
mashed potatoes, they become monotonous. At dinner they are impertinent.
At the end of three days Dick loathed sausages, and, going, forth,
pawned his watch to revel on sheep's head, which is not as cheap as it
looks, owing to the bones and the gravy. Then he returned to sausages
and mashed potatoes. Then he confined himself entirely to mashed
potatoes for a day, and was unhappy because of pain in his inside. Then
he pawned his waistcoat and his tie, and thought regretfully of money
thrown away in times past. There are few things more edifying unto
Art than the actual belly-pinch of hunger, and Dick in his few walks
abroad,--he did not care for exercise; it raised desires that could not
be satisfied--found himself dividing mankind into two classes,--those
who looked as if they might give him something to eat, and those who
looked otherwise. "I never knew what I had to learn about the human
face before," he thought; and, as a reward for his humility, Providence
caused a cab-driver at a sausage-shop where Dick fed that night to leave
half eaten a great chunk of bread. Dick took it,--would have fought all
the world for its possession,--and it cheered him.

The month dragged through at last, and, nearly prancing with impatience,
he went to draw his money. Then he hastened to Torpenhow's address
and smelt the smell of cooking meats all along the corridors of the
chambers. Torpenhow was on the top floor, and Dick burst into his room,
to be received with a hug which nearly cracked his ribs, as Torpenhow
dragged him to the light and spoke of twenty different things in the
same breath.

"But you're looking tucked up," he concluded.

"Got anything to eat? " said Dick, his eye roaming round the room.

"I shall be having breakfast in a minute. What do you say to sausages? "

"No, anything but sausages! Torp, I've been starving on that accursed
horse-flesh for thirty days and thirty nights. "

"Now, what lunacy has been your latest? "

Dick spoke of the last few weeks with unbridled speech. Then he opened
his coat; there was no waistcoat below. "I ran it fine, awfully fine,
but I've just scraped through. "

"You haven't much sense, but you've got a backbone, anyhow. Eat, and
talk afterwards. " Dick fell upon eggs and bacon and gorged till he could
gorge no more. Torpenhow handed him a filled pipe, and he smoked as men
smoke who for three weeks have been deprived of good tobacco.

"Ouf! " said he. "That's heavenly! Well? "

"Why in the world didn't you come to me? "

"Couldn't; I owe you too much already, old man. Besides I had a sort of
superstition that this temporary starvation--that's what it was, and it
hurt--would bring me luck later. It's over and done with now, and none
of the syndicate know how hard up I was. Fire away. What's the exact
state of affairs as regards myself? "

"You had my wire? You've caught on here. People like your work
immensely. I don't know why, but they do. They say you have a fresh
touch and a new way of drawing things. And, because they're chiefly
home-bred English, they say you have insight. You're wanted by half a
dozen papers; you're wanted to illustrate books. "

Dick grunted scornfully.

"You're wanted to work up your smaller sketches and sell them to the
dealers. They seem to think the money sunk in you is a good investment.
Good Lord! who can account for the fathomless folly of the public? "

"They're a remarkably sensible people. "

"They are subject to fits, if that's what you mean; and you happen to be
the object of the latest fit among those who are interested in what
they call Art. Just now you're a fashion, a phenomenon, or whatever you
please. I appeared to be the only person who knew anything about you
here, and I have been showing the most useful men a few of the sketches
you gave me from time to time. Those coming after your work on the
Central Southern Syndicate appear to have done your business. You're in
luck. "

"Huh! call it luck! Do call it luck, when a man has been kicking about
the world like a dog, waiting for it to come! I'll luck 'em later on. I
want a place to work first. "

"Come here," said Torpenhow, crossing the landing. "This place is a big
box room really, but it will do for you. There's your skylight, or
your north light, or whatever window you call it, and plenty of room to
thrash about in, and a bedroom beyond. What more do you need? "

"Good enough," said Dick, looking round the large room that took up a
third of a top story in the rickety chambers overlooking the Thames. A
pale yellow sun shone through the skylight and showed the much dirt of
the place. Three steps led from the door to the landing, and three
more to Torpenhow's room. The well of the staircase disappeared into
darkness, pricked by tiny gas-jets, and there were sounds of men talking
and doors slamming seven flights below, in the warm gloom.

"Do they give you a free hand here? " said Dick, cautiously. He was
Ishmael enough to know the value of liberty.

"Anything you like; latch-keys and license unlimited. We are permanent
tenants for the most part here. 'Tisn't a place I would recommend for a
Young Men's Christian Association, but it will serve. I took these rooms
for you when I wired. "

"You're a great deal too kind, old man. "

"You didn't suppose you were going away from me, did you? " Torpenhow put
his hand on Dick's shoulder, and the two walked up and down the room,
henceforward to be called the studio, in sweet and silent communion.
They heard rapping at Torpenhow's door. "That's some ruffian come up
for a drink," said Torpenhow; and he raised his voice cheerily. There
entered no one more ruffianly than a portly middle-aged gentleman in
a satin-faced frockcoat. His lips were parted and pale, and there were
deep pouches under the eyes.

"Weak heart," said Dick to himself, and, as he shook hands, "very weak
heart. His pulse is shaking his fingers. "

The man introduced himself as the head of the Central Southern Syndicate
and "one of the most ardent admirers of your work, Mr. Heldar. I assure
you, in the name of the syndicate, that we are immensely indebted to
you; and I trust, Mr. Heldar, you won't forget that we were largely
instrumental in bringing you before the public. " He panted because of
the seven flights of stairs.

Dick glanced at Torpenhow, whose left eyelid lay for a moment dead on
his cheek.

"I shan't forget," said Dick, every instinct of defence roused in him.

"You've paid me so well that I couldn't, you know. By the way, when I am
settled in this place I should like to send and get my sketches. There
must be nearly a hundred and fifty of them with you. "

"That is er--is what I came to speak about. I fear we can't allow it
exactly, Mr. Heldar. In the absence of any specified agreement, the
sketches are our property, of course. "

"Do you mean to say that you are going to keep them? "

"Yes; and we hope to have your help, on your own terms, Mr. Heldar, to
assist us in arranging a little exhibition, which, backed by our name
and the influence we naturally command among the press, should be of
material service to you. Sketches such as yours----"

"Belong to me. You engaged me by wire, you paid me the lowest rates you
dared. You can't mean to keep them! Good God alive, man, they're all
I've got in the world! "

Torpenhow watched Dick's face and whistled.

Dick walked up and down, thinking. He saw the whole of his little stock
in trade, the first weapon of his equipment, annexed at the outset of
his campaign by an elderly gentleman whose name Dick had not caught
aright, who said that he represented a syndicate, which was a thing for
which Dick had not the least reverence. The injustice of the proceedings
did not much move him; he had seen the strong hand prevail too often in
other places to be squeamish over the moral aspects of right and wrong.

But he ardently desired the blood of the gentleman in the frockcoat,
and when he spoke again, it was with a strained sweetness that Torpenhow
knew well for the beginning of strife.

"Forgive me, sir, but you have no--no younger man who can arrange this
business with me? "

"I speak for the syndicate. I see no reason for a third party to----"

"You will in a minute. Be good enough to give back my sketches. "

The man stared blankly at Dick, and then at Torpenhow, who was leaning
against the wall. He was not used to ex-employees who ordered him to be
good enough to do things.

"Yes, it is rather a cold-blooded steal," said Torpenhow, critically;
"but I'm afraid, I am very much afraid, you've struck the wrong man. Be
careful, Dick; remember, this isn't the Soudan. "

"Considering what services the syndicate have done you in putting your
name before the world----"

This was not a fortunate remark; it reminded Dick of certain vagrant
years lived out in loneliness and strife and unsatisfied desires. The
memory did not contrast well with the prosperous gentleman who proposed
to enjoy the fruit of those years.

"I don't know quite what to do with you," began Dick, meditatively. "Of
course you're a thief, and you ought to be half killed, but in your case
you'd probably die. I don't want you dead on this floor, and, besides,
it's unlucky just as one's moving in. Don't hit, sir; you'll only excite
yourself. "

He put one hand on the man's forearm and ran the other down the plump
body beneath the coat. "My goodness! " said he to Torpenhow, "and this
gray oaf dares to be a thief! I have seen an Esneh camel-driver have the
black hide taken off his body in strips for stealing half a pound of wet
dates, and he was as tough as whipcord. This thing's soft all over--like
a woman. "

There are few things more poignantly humiliating than being handled by
a man who does not intend to strike. The head of the syndicate began to
breathe heavily. Dick walked round him, pawing him, as a cat paws a
soft hearth-rug. Then he traced with his forefinger the leaden pouches
underneath the eyes, and shook his head. "You were going to steal my
things,--mine, mine, mine! --you, who don't know when you may die. Write
a note to your office,--you say you're the head of it,--and order them
to give Torpenhow my sketches,--every one of them. Wait a minute: your
hand's shaking. Now! " He thrust a pocket-book before him. The note
was written. Torpenhow took it and departed without a word, while Dick
walked round and round the spellbound captive, giving him such advice as
he conceived best for the welfare of his soul. When Torpenhow returned
with a gigantic portfolio, he heard Dick say, almost soothingly, "Now,
I hope this will be a lesson to you; and if you worry me when I have
settled down to work with any nonsense about actions for assault,
believe me, I'll catch you and manhandle you, and you'll die. You
haven't very long to live, anyhow. Go! Imshi, Vootsak,--get out! " The
man departed, staggering and dazed. Dick drew a long breath: "Phew! what
a lawless lot these people are! The first thing a poor orphan meets is
gang robbery, organised burglary! Think of the hideous blackness of that
man's mind! Are my sketches all right, Torp? "

"Yes; one hundred and forty-seven of them. Well, I must say, Dick,
you've begun well. "

"He was interfering with me. It only meant a few pounds to him, but it
was everything to me. I don't think he'll bring an action. I gave him
some medical advice gratis about the state of his body. It was cheap at
the little flurry it cost him. Now, let's look at my things. "

Two minutes later Dick had thrown himself down on the floor and was deep
in the portfolio, chuckling lovingly as he turned the drawings over and
thought of the price at which they had been bought.

The afternoon was well advanced when Torpenhow came to the door and saw
Dick dancing a wild saraband under the skylight.

"I builded better than I knew, Torp," he said, without stopping the
dance. "They're good! They're damned good! They'll go like flame! I
shall have an exhibition of them on my own brazen hook. And that man
would have cheated me out of it! Do you know that I'm sorry now that I
didn't actually hit him? "

"Go out," said Torpenhow,--"go out and pray to be delivered from the
sin of arrogance, which you never will be.