IN MY DISGUISE I AM MISTAKEN FOR LORD B.—A CLUB ACQUAINTANCE—TEDDY AT THE LAW COURTS—MRS. WINGHAM—THE DEFENCE AND THE ACQUITTAL—WE BOLT

Behold me, then, in sexagenarian disguise, trudging back into Monte Carlo, with my mackintosh and umbrella. It was barely nine o’clock in the morning when I started; and, soon after ten, there I was standing once more in front of the Casino buildings, out of which, but a few hours before, I had so triumphantly rushed.

Strange to say, there was no sign of anything extraordinary having occurred; there were the usual people sitting about reading the papers on the seats round the flower-beds, the usual attendants loafing on the steps, guarding the entrance. Over the building flapped, as ever, the dingy Monaco flag.

My first feeling was of intense annoyance and disgust that, notwithstanding our complete success, the nefarious business was apparently being carried on as usual. What on earth did it all mean? Were sixty thousand pounds as naught to them? Were they placidly going to put up with their loss, rather than advertise their misfortune? or, under this apparent calm, were there really depths of trouble and vengeance stirring—already rising—to ingulf poor Teddy, whom I never doubted from the first was captured, and now shortly about to appear before the Prince’s judges away up at Monaco, bent in painful submission at the criminal bar!

I sat down for a few moments to consider what should be done, and look about me for some one to whom I could apply for trustworthy information: what was thought of us, and what steps the authorities proposed to take.

There was an old gentlemen, an Englishman, evidently, sitting on my seat; and, as one garrulous old person to another might, I proceeded to try him cautiously with a few questions. Did he know, could he tell me, at what hour the rooms opened?

He looked at me over his pince-nez, and said at twelve. Then he flipped his pince-nez off, smiled, and, giving me a friendly look, politely observed he believed he and I were members of the same distinguished club, the Mausoloeum. He dared say I hadn’t forgotten dining next him there in the autumn, and the interesting talk we had then had.

“Aye, aye, aye,” I mumbled, in my fright, a mixture of Punch and Pantaloon.

He had seen me walking about before, he went on (what on earth did he mean by that, I wondered), and had meant to take the liberty of speaking to me. What I had said in the autumn had interested and impressed him very much, and he had often thought over it. Then he folded up his paper, and evidently began to lay himself out for a renewal of our supposed conversation, a prospect which much alarmed and disconcerted me.

I scarcely liked to exercise the complete vigor of my youth and make an immediate bolt; for I had doddered up to the seat and, like an aged pensioner, sat me down with a loud sigh of relief—rather overacting, in fact; so, if I were to keep up the character, I must at least dodder away again when I left. Yet, however complimentary to my make-up, it was, just at present, a distinct nuisance to find myself mistaken for somebody else, and likely to be detained over a conversation which, under no circumstances, could ever have had the faintest interest for me.

To prevent that, I cautiously began:

“My servant tells me there was a robbery, or something of that sort, in the rooms last night.”

“Oh!” said my club comrade.

“Have you heard anything about it?”

“No, indeed.”

“The Casino authorities keep a thing of that sort pretty close, I imagine,” I cautiously ventured.

“They’re quite right,” the old gentleman replied. “Quite right!” Then, after a pause, he went on, “I suppose you never spoke to Markham on the subject, after all?”

“No, indeed, I didn’t,” I mumbled, making the best reply I could under the circumstances. “Fact is, I never saw him.”

“Why, didn’t he turn up?”

“I forget.” And then I uneasily added, “You know what a feather-headed feller he is.”

The old gentleman laughed and said, “Somebody ought to speak to him, though.”

“Well, what’s the matter with his wife?” I said, unconsciously, dropping into one of Brentin’s phrases.

“That’s more than I can tell you,” the old gentleman replied. “She’s looked like that for a long time now.”

I was so rapidly getting tired of this footling talk, not to mention the fibs it entailed and the precious time being wasted, that, at any cost, I determined to put a stop to it; so I rose with an effort, and saying, vaguely, “Well, I’ve got to meet my wife; good-day to you! I dare say I shall see you again somewhere about,” strolled off towards the Casino steps.

The old gentleman, who had evidently looked forward to a long conversation, answered me rather gruffly, “Good-day!”—while straight up to one of the attendants at the head of the steps I walked.

“Yes, monsieur,” the man politely said, “the rooms are open for play at twelve.”

“As usual?” I pointedly observed.

“Altogether as usual.”

“Notwithstanding the robbery?”

“Oh, as for that,” the man replied, shrugging his shoulders, “it was a very small affair. The miserable was caught and would be punished.”

An Englishman, I understood.

Yes, an Englishman. No doubt at this moment he was being tried, and already safe in prison. “Au revoir, monsieur! À votre service, monsieur!”

My legs felt fully their assumed age as I turned and faltered down the steps. So all hope was over; poor Teddy was really caught, and the regiment would know him no more. Unless!—why, what could I do?—good gracious!—

I was so deep in my own troubled thoughts and plans, I scarcely noticed my supposed old club friend on the seat; should not have noticed him at all, in fact, had I not just at this moment, when I was calling a carriage to drive up to the “MonopÔle,” come plump on the other highly respectable elderly gentleman I evidently so closely resembled.

Face to face we met, and naturally stared at each other. Will it be believed we were absolutely exactly alike, down even to the cut and color of our clothes? For the first and only time in my life I saw myself at full length, myself as I should be at sixty (if I only took care of myself), sedate, healthy, a county magistrate, member of Brooke’s, with my youngest boy just leaving Eton. I hurried into the carriage and told the man to drive up to the “MonopÔle” as fast as he could go, just giving a look round at my friend on the seat as I got in. He had turned, and, with his hands on his knees, was staring after me, dumbfounded. My double had turned and was staring after me too.

To both those gentlemen, if they should ever chance to read this work, I offer my sincere apology; they will understand now the reason of my accidental resemblance, and, as between men of the world, will no doubt forgive it. I can assure them both it will not occur again; how can it, seeing that wig and whiskers are buried under an olive-tree on the Mentone road?

At the “MonopÔle”—having, of course, no notion who I really was—they were very polite. No, Madame Wingham was not in; they couldn’t say where she was; a letter had come for her early and she had gone out. Instinctively, I felt the letter was from Teddy, imploring succor.

I left the hotel at once and drove straight up to Monaco. At the cathedral I dismissed the carriage and walked on to the law courts. What to do I had no idea; watch the proceedings, at any rate, incognito from the back, and, at the worst, hear with my own sad ears how much poor Teddy got. Any thought of rescue was, of course, out of the question. What could a poor old person of sixty do against soldiers and gendarmes?

The criminal court of Monaco sits in a bare upper room, close to the cathedral. Outside, steep steps of the usual Palais de Justice inverted V-shape lead up to it, with, at their head, a bare flag-pole, like a barber’s sign. Up the steps I walked, and with beating heart (for my own sake, I confess, as much as for poor Teddy’s) entered the fatal, the lethal chamber. It was very full and stuffy. News of our victory and the capture of one of the band no doubt had spread, for the public part was crammed, tightly as sardines and garlic. Facing, under a crucifix, from over which the dingy green curtain was drawn, sat three judges; three real judges, in their bands and toques and ermine! Common white bedroom blinds scarcely kept the sun out, streaming in mistily on the members of the bar in beards and gowns, on the greffier busily writing, and the usher waiting to summon the luckless Parsons to the dock. Just at present the judges were bending the weight of their intellects on a couple of market-women charged with fighting; and there, tightly wedged against the partition, stood the forlorn Mrs. Wingham, a handkerchief in her black kid grasp, bending and talking tearfully to the barrister seated below, whom she apparently had engaged for the defence.

I made my way to her and pulled her sleeve.

“Come outside,” I whispered; “it’s I—hush!—Vincent Blacker.”

She stared at me, and then at last followed obediently to the door. We stood outside at the head of the steps.

“They’ve got him, I suppose?” I asked.

“Oh, you cowards!” she gasped, “to run away and leave him.”

“Never mind that now,” I answered; “I have come back, at any rate. Let us consider what can be done. You’ve got some one to defend him?”

“But the man talks such horrible French, I can’t understand a word he says,” she moaned, “and he reeks of garlic. And where’s my brother, James Thompson?”

“He’s all right,” I evasively replied. “Never mind him just now. We must really concentrate ourselves on doing something for poor Teddy.”

“Oh, I dare say! Now you mind this, young man!” cried Mrs. Wingham, with sudden vindictiveness. “If he goes to prison you go, too! I won’t ’ear of his going alone. I’ll shout to the police! I’ll ’ave you arrested! He sha’n’t be the only one to suffer, poor young lamb!”

The hair under my wig stood up on end, and even my false whiskers stiffened. The old woman was quite capable of executing her threat, and for a moment I felt, not sixty, but a hundred.

Outwardly, however, I was calm.

“Desperate cases require desperate remedies,” I judicially observed. “Take my arm and let us return to court. We’ll adopt our own line of defence. Come along, ma’am, and for the present kindly remember I am your husband and my name is Wingham.”

The vicious old woman held me so tightly, I knew that if Teddy went under and were condemned she meant me to go under, too. Together we wedged our way to the partition, just above our odoriferous barrister. I was bending to speak to him when suddenly a bell was rung and Teddy was immediately ushered, nay, thrust, in, between a couple of gendarmes.

Poor chap, he was almost unrecognizable, he had been so roughly handled. His smoking-suit was torn, and round his neck, in place of collar and tie, he had knotted a handkerchief, coster fashion; but what mostly disguised and disfigured him was his gashed and puffed face; for in falling down the steps he had fallen plump on a bunch of cactus, scoring him as though he had been mauled by an angry tigress. He never had been pretty, but now he looked exactly like the malefactor that, in the eye of the law, at any rate, I suppose he really was.

“Oh, just look at his face!” gasped Mrs. Wingham. “Oh, the poor creature!”

“Hush!” I whispered; “for goodness’ sake keep calm. And kindly remember he’s our nephew.”

I judged it wisest to hear the evidence against him before considering the line we should take in his defence. I contented myself for the present with whispering to our counsel that the prisoner was our nephew, his arrest a complete mistake, and he himself as innocent of any attempt at robbery as the newly born.

Meantime, in French fashion, the President of the Court—a robust old man with a white beard and a red face, like a neatly trimmed Father Christmas—after reading the act of accusation, was the first to tackle and brow-beat our unfortunate friend. To do him justice, Teddy kept beautifully cool (he says now he recognized me and my wink through the disguise, and knew he was safe) and answered nothing through his puffed mouth but Nong! and Jammy! Every now and then the President, in the politest manner in the world, observed, “Vous mentez, jeune homme!” or “C’est faux!” while the judge on his right, a battered little man with blue glasses and his mouth all fallen in, ejaculated “Quelle effronterie!” or “C’est abominable!” at intervals.

As a matter of fact, the evidence against him (according to our English notions, at any rate) was far from strong. There were croupiers present ready to swear to having seen him in the rooms, charging down on the tables with a revolver; there were the men from the door to swear they had noticed him rush past; and there were the firemen who had found him crawling away behind the signal-box, down on the line, after we had got clear away. Very good. But the cactus had, for the present, so disfigured him, that an adroit cross-examination could not fail very much to shake them, and that, no doubt, the President felt; for, after wrangling with Teddy for some time, and receiving nothing but an eruption of Nongs and Jammys for his pains, he ill-temperedly cried identification would be useless and unfair with the accused’s face in its present condition, and that, until the swelling disappeared, he should remand him; by which time, he sardonically added, he had no doubt the other malefactors would be before him in a row.

Teddy gave me a piteous glance, and, nerving myself, I nudged our barrister, whom all along I had been coaching, and up he got.

Now, most fortunately, when poor Teddy was caught, neither revolver nor spoil were found on him; spoil he had never had, and the revolver, after the final discharge, he had hurled over the embankment into the sea. And he had always told the same story: that he had truly enough been in the rooms, but had nothing whatever to do with the robbery, having been forced out in the disturbance, and run as the others had; running, in his alarm, he knew not where, until he fell down the steps, lost his senses, and, coming to, found himself in the hands of the police. He was a quiet, respectable young Englishman, he declared, come to Monte Carlo for his health, and staying with his aunt at the hotel “MonopÔle,” to whom (as I thought) he had early despatched a note, announcing himself as her nephew and in trouble, and imploring help.

And here we were to claim him, after so unpleasant an experience, Milor and Madame Ving-ham—so the barrister announced us!—persons of the highest consideration and wealth, constant visitors on the shores of the hospitable Riviera; in short, this, that, and the other, all couched in the finest language, and none of it in the least true. And then, in a final peroration, amid murmurs of sympathy, culminating in a burst of applause, the barrister threw up his fat hands, and invoked justice, mercy, and international law (not to mention the hospitality of old Greece and Rome), and, sitting down, wiped his forehead with the sleeve of his gown; while Madame Ving-ham judiciously lifted up her troubled voice, and wept louder than ever.

When the emotion had subsided, the President called me forward, and for the second time that morning my unlucky resemblance to another gentleman (a nobleman, by-the-way, as it turned out) was likely to get me into further trouble; for in me, Vincent Blacker, disguised as an old boy of sixty, the President imagined he recognized, just as my club friend had done an hour before, a distinguished guest he had met the previous evening at the Prince’s table; with whom he had held an improving discussion as to the present unsatisfactory condition of the British House of Lords, and the best method of amending, without destroying it.

“Comment, Milor!” he cried, in astonishment, looking at me over his glasses; “c’est votre Seigneurie?”

Good Lord, I said to myself, here we are again—giving the old man a polite but alarmed bow and smile.

But the President knew me as Milor B., he ventured to observe (I really don’t quite like to give the illustrious name), and here was our advocate announcing me as some one else!

I hastened to explain, with perspiration on my brow, that Ving-ham was my second title, and in an unfortunate affair of this kind—Cour d’Assises, in short—I did not care for my first to be publicly mixed up.

The President bowed and said that was well understood, and then he proceeded to put me a few exceedingly polite and fatuous questions about Teddy, who, as a contrite nephew cut to the heart at so unfortunately dragging an old and honored name through the purlieus of the criminal law, was acting his part to perfection.

Yes, monsieur was my nephew, of a character gentle and affectionate; of retiring habits and delicate health, a little poitrinaire, in fact (at which Teddy, comprehending, coughed with unnecessary violence), but all that was of obedient, tractable, and good. He had gone down to the Casino, while we, my wife and I—Madame Ving-ham still weeping—had gone to bed, believing he was in his room; and the next we had heard was early that morning, when we received a note from him announcing the unfortunate capture and mistake. Monsieur le PrÉsident would readily understand what of grief and desolation?—my affectionate uncle’s voice, with a touch of an only nephew in it, trembled, and madame shook convulsively as, still grasping my arm tight, she moaned and sobbed.

That was more than enough. In a very few minutes, after a brief consultation among the judges, Teddy was released and dramatically embracing us in the body of the court—thereby nearly bringing off my left whisker—and I was paying our eloquent counsel. Before I left the yacht I had providentially provided myself with a bundle of notes from the heap of spoil on the table, and one of them—for a thousand francs—I presented to the astonished and gratified barrister. I trembled to think how much more than ever for the next few days he would reek of his favorite ail.

Out went Mrs. Wingham, arm in arm with Teddy, and I followed, after declining the President’s kind invitation to breakfast with him, on the score of my overwrought feelings.

Just as I was going down the steps a man I recognized as a croupier touched me respectfully on the arm, with a crafty, meridional smile. I stopped in some alarm, thinking it possible I was discovered. What did he want? Why, Milor no doubt remembered that lady whom Milor had commissioned the croupier to find out all about and let him know? Perfectly, I replied, with stiff and aristocratic upper lip. What had he discovered?

She was an Italian, one Madame Vagliano, and she lived at the Villa des Genets, above the Condamine. He was proceeding with more information, when I haughtily cut him short with “C’est bien! assez! voici madame qui nous observe,” and handing him a note, which I afterwards discovered was unfortunately one of a thousand francs instead of, as I meant, a hundred, I hurried to the foot of the steps, where madame and Teddy were awaiting me. Ce scÉlÈrat de Lord B.! I have really a good mind to give his illustrious name, after all.

We walked on a little way in silence, and then Mrs. Wingham said, with traces of tearfulness:

“What are you two villains going to do now?”

“Bolt!” I replied, laconically.

“And where’s my poor brother James all this time?”

“He’s all right, enjoying himself first-rate, sailing about somewhere in the Saratoga.”

“What’s the Saratoga?”

“A well-appointed steam-yacht, belonging to a friend of ours.”

“You thieving wretches! You’ve been and decoyed him on board, you know you ’ave.”

“Well, he’s perfectly safe, wherever he is. Come along, Teddy, there’s no time to be lost.”

“But I can’t go like this,” cried Teddy. “I haven’t even got a hat, and all my clothes are on the yacht.”

We bought him a dreadful French straw-hat up in Monaco, and then we jumped into a carriage and drove down to the tailor’s, next the “Grand Hotel.” As we drove, I questioned Mrs. Wingham as to what was known and said in the town about our escapade.

“Why,” said Mrs. Wingham, “people have been terribly frightened, and are beginning to leave the place.”

“Good! And what line are the authorities taking?”

“They are denying it all, right and left, but they are determined to catch you, all the same.”

“They can’t do both!” I coldly replied. “They’d much better put up with their loss; we shall put the money to much better use than they could ever have done. If they are going to make themselves unpleasant over it, you may tell them from me we’ll come back and do precisely the same thing next year.”

“You impudent young feller!” cried the angry old woman, “you forget that one of the sharpest detectives in England is after you.”

“He’s taking a mighty circuitous route!”

“But he’ll catch you, all the same, at last.”

“Will he?” I answered, eying her with cold amusement. “Now look here, missus, if you say much more I’ll communicate with Van Ginkel, and direct him to take the yacht across to Cuba and have James landed and shot there as a filibuster.”

Whereupon the poor old soul fell to whimpering again, though at the same time she couldn’t help laughing a little at my readiness.

Teddy was soon fitted out at the tailor’s, and a sight he looked in what they called the dernier cri of a French travelling costume; more like a young man out of the Petit Journal pour rire than anything.

“Adieu, Madame Ving-ham!” I laughed, as we got outside. “Your nephew and I are going to get bicycles and be off down the Corniche, over the Italian frontier. Say good-bye to him, and be off home to Brixton yourself as soon as possible, or you may get into trouble with the police here for using a false title of nobility. Now, you did, you know! it’s no use your denying it. Take my advice; the quieter you keep for the next few months the better.”

She was so angry she wouldn’t say good-bye to me, but she overwhelmed poor Parsons. And she implored him as soon as possible to give up my desperate bad company, which, sooner or later, could only bring him to ruin—I, if you please, who at so much risk had just rescued him!—and to write to her soon to Brixton, and come and see her directly he got back.

She stood watching us as we went off to the bicycle man’s in the Arcade, near Ciro’s, and kept on waving her handkerchief till we got into the gardens across the road and were lost to view.

“Now let this be a lesson to you, my son,” I sagely observed, as we hurried along, “always to make yourself pleasant and polite to old ladies. But for Mrs. Wingham, you might have been dragging a cannon-ball at your ankle for years.”

Teddy shuddered, and said:

“What a blessing I resembled her nephew!”

“And mine!” I added. “Don’t forget me.”