by R S Surtees
CHAPTER XLVI.
SIVIN AND FOUR AGAIN.
MONEY, MONEY, MONEY, being our rich man’s sole end and aim, he was as cunning in getting it as a rat-catcher is at getting the rats to take his traps. Moreover, he had been tried in so many different ways, — bad bills, middling bills, forged bills, bad securities, middling securities, no securities — that he fancied himself half a lawyer, and talked and argued as if he were a whole one. This being a sort of character that a real lawyer does not like, our friend had been bowed out by independent practitioners and had now taken refuge under the pliant ignorance of young Mr. Saplington, who did his private business for nothing, in consideration of what he got out of the bank for writing—” on or before letters,” issuing latitats and missives of the forcing imperative order. Our Banker, indeed, would seem to have a natural relish and appreciation for the law, for whenever he got a bundle of title-deeds into his possession, he would set-to and read every document from end to end, no matter how mouldy or musty, and seemed thoroughly to enjoy their dreary headaching contents. Then, having them once into his clutches, no power on earth could induce him to let them go out of his sight until he got his money repaid. Saplington might come and copy them in his little den at the bank for anybody wanting to know their contents, but no taking away even to Saplington’s office, and as soon as the dinner hour came, back they were bundled into the tin box, the Bramah lock replaced, and the whole returned to the vast abyss of the strong iron safe. Many thousand acres of land had been compressed within its solid sides, many cornstacks, many haystacks, many flocks and herds, many horses and implements of husbandry.
With a man so exact, even in a loan, with all the circumjacent contrivances to protect him, it is needless to say that in an out-and-out purchase he was consistently cautious, and Docket and he having at length got a deal, and the difficulty of the case might be thought to be over, lo and behold! it would seem to be only beginning, just as in matrimony, the difficulties are often all to come to, after the parties themselves think everything is smoothly settled, and are announcing the fact to their already well-aware friends.
Mr. Goldspink would seem to have conjured up all the blots and defects of all the titles he and his predecessors had ever had through their hands since the establishment of the bank in sivinteen hundred and sivinty-four, and to have invested Garlandale with the whole of them. Like Gil Bias’s mule, the title would seem to be all faults. The consequence was that he made Mr. Saplington put so many points and doubts, and queries, and draw his attention to so many things, that Mr. James Habendum, the conveyancer of the Temple, naturally concluded the Banker was an unwilling purchaser, wanting to be off his bargain. Now it so happened that the title was singularly clear, twist it as he would, Mr. Habendum could make nothing against it — nothing fatal at least — for it must be a marvellous title that a keennosed lawyer cannot take some exceptions to, but the evident anxiety of the party made him set his best wits to work to try if he could accommodate him, when he hit upon the following instance of the beautiful simplicity of our real property laws.
There had been a trust-money mortgage on the estate some forty years before, and between the time of making the mortgage and paying it off a new trustee, one Mr. Cracknel Cauldfield, had been appointed, which enabled Mr. Habendum to suggest that unless the death of the original trustee and the due appointment of his successor could be shown, the money (notwithstanding the surviving trustee joined in the receipt) might have been wrongly paid, and an intending purchaser might have to pay it over again — and this, after the lapse of the forty years, during which no claim for either principal or interest had ever been made; and Mr. Habendum further played as he thought into the Banker’s hands by saying that unless the vendor could show all this, a Court of Equity would not enforce the performance of the contract. The Banker was appalled when he read the opinion. It would have done Mr. Habendum good to have seen how he took it. “Sivin and four’s elivin!” exclaimed he to Mr. Saplington as that gentleman presented him in his little den at the bank with what he too thought would be an agreeable document, “Sivin and four’s elivin and eighty-four is ninety-five, and a underd-and-one is a underd and ninety-six. Why this is indeed a tremendous announcement! — a lamentable discovery! Thought the title seemed as clear as the sun at noon-day, and here have I gone and told Mrs. Goldspink and she has told Mrs. Wedlock, and Mrs. Wedlock will have told Mrs. Sinney, and it will be all over the town that I’ve bought the estate, and now I haven’t got it. Oh dear! Oh dear!” continued he, wringing his fat hands in despair, “one should never holla without leave of the lawyers!” so saying, he sunk into the old hard-seated semi-circular chair in which he had spent so much time, and calculated so much agreeable money.
Presently he became more composed, and looked at the matter in a different light. “Sirin, and four’s elivin,” said he, crossing his fat legs and dry-sharing his chin, and “forty-one is fifty-two; it’s lucky praps that things have turned out as they have done. If I had set-to and built a messunge, tenement, or dwelling-house, with the appurtenances, and just as I got my carpets cut, and all on the square, this horrid old Cracknel Cauldfield had cast up from the continent, from Holland, or Flushing, or wherever he has been hiding, demanding the whole in the name of the Queen, or of Sir Alexander Cockburn, Baronet, at ‘Westminster, I should have been in a pretty predicament; wholly, entirely, completely ruined.” Mr. Saplington then essayed to pacify him by pointing out that Mr. Goldspink would not lose the estate, but would only have to pay the mortgage -money over again; whereupon the banker seized upon the unfortunate word “only,” and worked it in a way that plainly showed he did not think it any trifle paying for a place twice over.
At length, having let off his vehemence, he began to take matters in a more amiable mood; and, now, for the first time, enlightened Mr. Saplington with the fact that he really wanted to buy the estate, and was not nibbling at it as an investment, or for the sake of covering a loan, and though he could not think of touching without the flaw being removed, he instructed Mr. Saplington to inform Mr. Docket that he should expect Mr. Docket to produce Mr. Cracknel Cauldfield dead or alive, to clear up the mystery about the money. And the lawyer having taken his departure, the Banker added another doubt to his long list of legal difficulties.
Wouldn’t he take care for the future to see that trustees were properly appointed! He would take nothing for granted. No, not even that he had a nose on his face without seeing it. And the inviting smell of roast goose now invading his den, our friend locked the opinion up in his safe, and proceeded to the discussion of meure agreeable matters.
CHAPTER XLVII.
MR. TOM TAILINGS.
WE MENTIONED INCIDENTALLY that our hero, Mr. Jasper Goldspink, had a sporting chum, the ostler’s son at the Bear and Ragged Staff Inn, at Mayfield, and coming performances requiring that he should be more specifically introduced, we will here take the liberty of doing so, His name was Tailings, Mr. Thomas Tailings, son of the bow-legged old ostler, who had fairly worn off his cow-lock by touching it for eleemosynary shillings and sixpences, for hoisting half-drunken farmers and others on to their horses. Old Tom had a good strain of sporting blood in his nerves, being a son of the well-known old Tailings, the ostler at the Eclipse Inn at Easingwold, in the palmy days of “eight out and four in and though Tailings, the father, had never been able to recreate his sporting propensities as he could wish, yet he was right glad to see “wor Tom,” as he called his son, in a better position, more particularly as the pursuit brought him in money, and caused him to rise from the obscurity of fustian into the smart bow-legged swell, whiffing his cigar, with his dirty-nailed hands deeply ensconsed in his well puckered peg-top trouser pockets, so familiar to turfites on a variety of race-courses. Notwithstanding the garnish of dress, however, there is still the same manifest likeness between Tailings the father, and Tailings the son, as there is between Her Most Gracious Majesty’s profile on a half-crown, and Her Most Gracious Majesty’s pro
file on a half-penny; the same square Tailings face, the same Tailings pug nose, the same little ferrety eye, the same sly mouth, above all, the same beautiful bow-legs, so inviting to a headstrong run-a-way pig to pop through.
Although it is pleasant in this hard-featured money-striving world, to see honest, plodding industry gradually surmount the difficulties of life, and rise to eminence and distinction; yet there is no such feeling engendered in beholding the mushroom exhalations of the turf expanding under the sunshine of prosperity; for somehow the “critturs,” as Jock Haggish would call them, never know how to behave themselves. They always do something preposterous, either burst out into gaudy-coloured liveries, or carriages with two grooms in the rumble, or make some such outrageous extravagant display as causes the public to laugh, and their comrades to blush for their impudence.
Indeed we do not know, but that compelling them to exhibit themselves in some such way, is the best punishment for their audacity; for assuredly there is no position in which a man who has no business in one, feels so awkward as when shut up in a close carriage. The contortions of a half-drunken sailor enjoying himself is nothing to it; for Jack thinks it is all right, and that everybody is envying him, while the poor turfite is soon most painfully convinced that everybody is laughing at him, even to the servants who take pay for sitting behind him. Fancy the honour of serving a blackleg! Somehow the service is generally of short duration, for, as we have said before, turf-gotten money never seems to prosper, the recipients being up to-day and down to-morrow. Like moths they flutter round the candle of prosperity, and then suddenly extinguish themselves, either with more betting, or brandy and water, or perhaps with a combination of both.
Mr. Tom Tailings, at the time of our story, had just about got to the half-way house of turf prosperity — the period of existence that in the corresponding life of an artisan, would lead him to call for sherry and water instead of ale, wine-drinking being considered by some as the first stage on the road to gentility. Tailings, however, was a good deal in advance of the sherry; he called for champagne, a beverage that is also a good deal in advance of its time, seeing that there is about quadruple the quantity consumed that the vineyards produce. However, Tom paid for it as champagne, and he had a right to call it so if he liked. In addition to the fine clothes, the fine ties, the fine pins, and the “excellent sparkling,” Tom had secured some two or three hundred pounds, which he complimented by calling thousands, or “thoosands,” as he pronounced it; and leg-like, he yearned to display it. If a trader gets into a good thing he keeps it to himself, or perhaps runs it down while he quietly feathers his nest; but a “leg” likes to be noisy, and brawling, and attracting attention.
Kind fortune soon sent Mr. Tom the means of distinguishing himself. It so happened that the ill luck of the Forty Thieves, pursued them to the end of the season, and made them resolve at the end of the “hay and straw meeting,” to convert some of their horses into money; and steam enabling a man to be anywhere and everywhere, Mr. Tom Tailings duly appeared with our hero among the select circle formed round the temporary rostrum of Mr. Dweller, the auctioneer, who was entrusted with the dispersion of the draft, to affect the sale of which of course a good many were introduced into the catalogue that were not meant to be parted with, except at full, or perhaps fancy, prices.
Time was that the tap of the auctioneer’s hammer was supposed to denote the conversion of property into money, but modern “science” long since introduced a custom, — chiefly among household goods but now extended to horses, and perhaps to everything else — whereby the efforts of the auctioneer are but preliminary to the completion of the transfer, the intermediate process being what is technically called the “knock out.” At every sale there are certain parties present who are ready to take things at their own price; but this of course, not being agreeable to the honourable fraternity generally, they form themselves into a sort of joint-stock company, for the purpose of running up any bond fide bidder who declines to avail himself of the terms of the “knock out.” If, however, an intending purchaser does agree to come in, then one of the party bids, and the rest direct their energies to ridiculing and running down the lot — declaring, if a carpet, that a person can see through it; if a carriage, that the wheels are so rotten the wood won’t hold the nails; and if a horse, that he is either touched in the wind, or so slow, that a man could beat him on foot, by which means in nine cases out of ten perhaps, where the property is for absolute sale, they succeed in getting it at half its real value. The hammer having fallen, then comes the real legitimate — or, more correctly speaking, illegitimate sale; the late runners down now become the runners up, the lot is assessed at something like its fair value, and the transaction closes with a gain to both buyers, and, of course, a loss to the owner of the property; and also to the auctioneer, who is thus defrauded, or at all events, deprived of a portion of his fees.
That is now a common process, and it seems that where honour has ceased to exist amongst thieves, no number — not even forty — will restore its equilibrium; for the united confederates were subjected to the same treatment on the reduction of their stud, as old farmer Hobnail would have to undergo on the seizure of his pigs, and his poultry for rent. Our new acquaintance, Mr. Tailings, having a half-cousin in the “knock out” line, commissioned him to bid for two or three lots, whose pedigrees and performances did not threaten to make too great a hole in his “thoosands,” and after the usual amount of laughing, throat-squeezing, rib-thumping, trottings up and trottings down, with exhortations from Mr. Dweller to the company to bid, a very good-looking bay colt, with a white ratch down its face, called Honest Billy, by Pickpocket, was knocked down at an apparently very low figure.
The same observation that we made with regard to peoples’ heads, namely, that no amount of outward inspection will enable a person to say where the brains arc, and where they are not, applies also to the speed, if not to the endurance of horses, for assuredly no one seeing an animal huddled up in straw, or at exercise in sheeting and hoods, or trotting along to the excitement of the hammer, can predict how he may be endowed with speed on a suitable course, with ground to his mind, and all the other contingencies that constitute the uncertainties of a race. True, the Forty Thieves had tried Honest Billy, and found him wanting; but then, the thieves go for the great stakes, whereas our confederates were only nibblers, who would be content with the pickings of the minor courses, and Tailings’ half-cousin intimating that our friends might be good customers, the members of the “knock out,” consented to let them have the horse for twenty pounds more than they gave. And so our hero was launched on the turf.
Honest Billy, however, was not destined to retrieve his lost laurels under his old name, for the purchase being made just at the time that the Banker incautiously hollo’d about the estate, it was resolved that it would only be a proper compliment to call the horse after the property, namely, “Garlandale.” So Honest Billy was duly rechristened under a proper discharge of the “best sparkling,” and many predictions were indulged in as to the money he would win, and the cups and trophies with which he would decorate the sideboard of the dining-room in the projected new Hall. How far the anticipations were fulfilled will appear as we proceed in our story.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
MR. CRACKNEL CAULDFIELD.
WHAT A WONDERFUL institution is “The Times!” It is a perfect modern miracle. It has kept increasing for the last five-and-twenty years, till it is nearly the size of the table-cloth on which it is laid every morning at breakfast-time. No one feels fit to confront his fellow-men until he has mastered its leading contents. Through its medium every wish may be announced, and every want supplied. The second column of the supplement contains hints for a hundred novels. The open, the mysterious, the anxious, the forgiving, the mandatory, the admonitory, the conciliatory. Take a sample—” Folly. — All going on well: write immediately,” &c.
“S. T. B. — Hereford — write immediately to M. J., Farnham,” &c.<
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“My dear sister, I arrived in town on the 1st and found,” &c.
“P. Q. Gratefully acknowledges your bounty, most acceptable — very ill,” &c.
Then comes a whole list of losses:
“Lost, a terrier; a letter; a portmanteau; a portmonnaie; a brooch; a locket.”
Next the sentimental:
“If the gentleman who travelled in the 3-5 p in train, &c., to, &c, with a lady in a pink bonnet and ermine tippet, will,” &c.
Followed by:
“Found a red and white pointer dog,” &c.
“If this should meet the eye of,” &c.
“Missing friends in Australia,” &c.
“To heirs at law.”
“Caution to purchasers of revolvers.”
And so on to the bottom of the column.
Then the general announcements include almost every possible requirement: Houses, horses, estates, cooks, coals, coachmen, carriages, straw, stockings, steam-boats, candles, canaries, cows, books, bottles, boots, clocks, clothing, chickens, soap, sugar, shipments, towels, trousers, teeth, corsets, crinoline, cottage-pianos, bedsteads, brandy, Brighton, microscopes, mangles, and mustard; harmoniums, harrows, and hyacinths; umbrellas, and rollers — every imaginable article, and so arranged too, that a person knows exactly into which folds of the tablecloth to look for the advertisement of what he requires.