He had pressed money upon the man, and very foolishly had explained everything but his name. This he clung to, for he had a vision of tall head–lines in the New York papers, and well knew no son of Merton Sargent could expect mercy that side the water. The guard, to Wilton's amazement, refused the money on the grounds that this was a matter for the Company to attend to. Wilton insisted on his incognito, and, therefore, found two policemen waiting for him at St. Botolph terminus. When he expressed a wish to buy a new hat and telegraph to his friends, both policemen with one voice warned him that whatever he said would be used as evidence against him; and this had impressed Wilton tremendously.
"They were so infernally polite," he said. "If they had clubbed me I wouldn't have cared; but it was, 'Step this way, sir,' and, 'Up those stairs, please, sir,' till they jailed me—jailed me like a common drunk, and I had to stay in a filthy little cubby–hole of a cell all night."
"That comes of not giving your name and not wiring your lawyer," I replied. "What did you get?"
"Forty shillings, or a month," said Wilton, promptly,—"next morning bright and early. They were working us off, three a minute. A girl in a pink hat—she was brought in at three in the morning—got ten days. I suppose I was lucky. I must have knocked his senses out of the guard. He told the old duck on the bench that I had told him I was a sergeant in the army, and that I was gathering beetles on the track. That comes of trying to explain to an Englishman."
"And you?"
"Oh, I said nothing. I wanted to get out. I paid my fine, and bought a new hat, and came up here before noon next morning. There were a lot of people in the house, and I told 'em I'd been unavoidably detained, and then they began to recollect engagements elsewhere. Hackman must have seen the fight on the track and made a story of it. I suppose they thought it was distinctly American—confound 'em! It's the only time in my life that I've ever flagged a train, and I wouldn't have done it but for that scarab. 'T wouldn't hurt their old trains to be held up once in a while."
"Well, it's all over now," I said, choking a little. "And your name didn't get into the papers. It is rather transatlantic when you come to think of it."
"Over!" Wilton grunted savagely. "It's only just begun. That trouble with the guard was just common, ordinary assault—merely a little criminal business. The flagging of the train is civil, infernally civil,—and means something quite different. They're after me for that now."
"Who?"
"The Great Buchonian. There was a man in court watching the case on behalf of the Company. I gave him my name in a quiet corner before I bought my hat, and—come to dinner now; I'll show you the results afterwards." The telling of his wrongs had worked Wilton Sargent into a very fine temper, and I do not think that my conversation soothed him. In the course of the dinner, prompted by a devil of pure mischief, I dwelt with loving insistence on certain smells and sounds of New York which go straight to the heart of the native in foreign parts; and Wilton began to ask many questions about his associates aforetime—men of the New York Yacht Club, Storm King, or the Restigouche, owners of rivers, ranches, and shipping in their playtime, lords of railways, kerosene, wheat, and cattle in their offices. When the green mint came, I gave him a peculiarly oily and atrocious cigar, of the brand they sell in the tessellated, electric–lighted, with expensive–pictures of the nude adorned bar of the Pandemonium, and Wilton chewed the end for several minutes ere he lit it. The butler left us alone, and the chimney of the oak–panelled diningroom began to smoke.
"That's another!" said he, poking the fire savagely, and I knew what he meant. One cannot put steam–heat in houses where Queen Elizabeth slept. The steady beat of a night–mail, whirling down the valley, recalled me to business. "What about the Great Buchonian?" I said.
"Come into my study. That's all—as yet."
It was a pile of Seidlitz–powders–coloured correspondence, perhaps nine inches high, and it looked very businesslike.
"You can go through it," said Wilton. "Now I could take a chair and a red flag and go into Hyde Park and say the most atrocious things about your Queen, and preach anarchy and all that, y' know, till I was hoarse, and no one would take any notice. The Police damn 'em!—would protect me if I got into trouble. But for a little thing like flagging a dirty little sawed–off train,—running through my own grounds, too,—I get the whole British Constitution down on me as if I sold bombs. I don't understand it."
"No more does the Great Buchonian—apparently." I was turning over the letters. "Here's the traffic superintendent writing that it's utterly incomprehensible that any man should…Good heavens, Wilton, you have done it!" I giggled, as I read on.
"What's funny now?" said my host.
"It seems that you, or Howard for you, stopped the three–forty Northern down."
"I ought to know that! They all had their knife into me, from the engine–driver up."
"But it's the three–forty—the Induna—surely you've heard of the Great Buchonian's Induna!"
"How the deuce am I to know one train from another? They come along about every two minutes."
"Quite so. But this happens to be the Induna—the one train of the whole line. She's timed for fifty–seven miles an hour. She was put on early in the Sixties, and she has never been stopped—"
"I know! Since William the Conqueror came over, or King Charles hid in her smoke–stack. You're as bad as the rest of these Britishers. If she's been run all that while, it's time she was flagged once or twice."
The American was beginning to ooze out all over Wilton, and his small–boned hands were moving restlessly.
"Suppose you flagged the Empire State Express, or the Western Cyclone?"
"Suppose I did. I know Otis Harvey—or used to. I'd send him a wire, and he'd understand it was a ground–hog case with me. That's exactly what I told this British fossil company here."
"Have you been answering their letters without legal advice, then?"
"Of course I have."
"Oh, my Sainted Country! Go ahead, Wilton."
"I wrote 'em that I'd be very happy to see their president and explain to him in three words all about it; but that wouldn't do. 'Seems their president must be a god. He was too busy, and—well, you can read for yourself—they wanted explanations. The stationmaster at Amberley Royal—and he grovels before me, as a rule—wanted an explanation, and quick, too. The head sachem at St. Botolph's wanted three or four, and the Lord High Mukkamuk that oils the locomotives wanted one every fine day. I told 'em—I've told hem about fifty times—I stopped their holy and sacred train because I wanted to board her. Did they think I wanted to feel her pulse?"