It did not need much persuasion to induce Paul to accompany Mrs. Dibble on her projected journey to Severntown. He easily obtained permission to leave the Pyrotechnic for a couple of days, and on a miserable December morning they arrived at the famous city of Severntown—famous in the present day for many things: for its noble cathedral, as we have already intimated; for its grand old river, its clean broad streets and its narrow dirty ones, through which a king was chased by Cromwellian troops.
A city to be proud of this same Severntown—to be proud of for its historical associations, its eminent men and women, ancient and modern; a city surrounded by a beautiful country, studded with the seats of noblemen, whose four-in-hands are still oftentimes seen rattling over the white road-ways; a city that was wont, in ancient days, to have unusually fierce election contests, and which is now settling down into moderate opinions, and throwing its latent political fire into commercial enterprise. It manufactures all kinds of things which have a strange sound when mentioned together, such as steam-engines and porcelain, pickles and horse-hair, carriages and sauce, fire-grates and shirt-studs, gin and boots, and other machines, condiments, ornaments, spirits, and wearing apparel. It has quarrels about sewers, the price of gas, and the state of the streets, like all other provincial towns, and a long dirty road to the railway station.
There was a row of six cabs and an antique sort of bus at the railway station, and several ragged youngsters who offered to carry the travellers’ carpet-bags.
Close by the station Paul detected a comfortable-looking inn, into which inn he and Mrs. Dibble directed their steps—not that Mrs. Dibble approved of inns, for she did not, as she told Paul over and over again, although in the course of business her father had been called upon to build several establishments of the kind, and the specifications had gone through her hands; but no doubt they were necessary sometimes, and she thought they were justified in taking up their abode at one, and having something hot and some tea at this inn in particular, and on the shortest possible notice; so Paul ordered the refreshment whilst Mrs. Dibble, struggling under a load of shawls and comforters and rugs, was shown to her room.
If Mrs. Dibble had had the smallest compunction about entering the railway tavern, she had no hesitation about the chops and the tea and the muffins and watercress, which she was liberal enough to commend, giving very practical illustrations of her approval of the fare, and all the time talking of her poor appetite, and telling Paul how seriously Mr. Dibble’s conduct had injured her health. She became so confidential upon this point, and at length felt herself so much at home that she permitted the hooks-and-eyes nearest her chin to disengage themselves, and insisted upon Paul joining her in just sixpenny-worth of spirits-and-water before they ventured out in the cold to discover the yard by the Blue Posts Inn.
The spirits-and-water made them both very warm and comfortable, and Paul at length offered his arm to his companion, and away they started towards the point indicated.
It was a damp, drizzling night, and there were treacherous holes here and there in the path which Mrs. Dibble assured Paul were in the highest degree uncomfortable. She was sure her stockings would be that splashed that they would not be fit to be seen.
Severntown did not look at all inviting in the hazy light of the December gas; but Paul knew the place, and redeemed its character to some extent by telling Mrs. Dibble that they were in the back slums, which she said she could readily understand.
Through dirty streets, with one or two bridges over black, murky water; past lazy carts and rumbling cabs splashing through the mud; by narrow footways, which were sometimes no footways at all; it was certainly no pleasant route to the Blue Posts. At length, however, they came to a fine, open, well-lit street, and after walking a short distance in this brighter locality, they turned sharply round into a narrow passage, and then emerged into an open, muddy square.
Here was situated Digby Martin’s Temple of Magic, and Mrs. Dibble and Paul stopped to study the scene before them.
About two hundred persons of all ages were crowded in front of a show of the old-fashioned traditional stamp. A small platform, which was ascended by broad wooden steps, was surmounted with a very florid painting of a character that evidently proved highly attractive to the audience. A lady in a low dress, with a wonderful necklace round her neck, and very dazzling bracelets upon her arms, was represented in the attitude of pointing at a box, from which two pigeons were flying, in the direction of an auditory consisting of a king and numerous officers in the army. Several rabbits were quietly peeping out of a saucepan placed upon a fire, a shower of cards and fruit and watches was falling from an inverted hat, and in the background were sundry mystic signs beneath a blazing sun.
The companion picture was, if possible, of a higher order of merit, though of a simpler character. It represented the young lady in the low dress crouching beneath a capacious basket, and it also represented the same basket being raised by a man with black moustachios, who significantly pointed to the vacant space beneath; underneath was written in big letters, “The Famous Basket Trick.”
Hung at various points in frames of various character, was represented a tremendous dog going through an exciting and varied performance. Here he stood upon his head, there he fired off a pistol; in another place he was engaged in a sort of pugilistic encounter with a professional bruiser, and around the frames which contained these pictorial attractions was printed, “The celebrated dog ‘Momus’ in a round of favourite and world-renowned characters.”
The proprietor of the caravan had had a great argument with the artist who executed these latter works upon the propriety of calling Momus a “dogess,” which the showman thought would be sure to “draw;” but the artist had gravely assured him that such a title would not come within the rules of strict art, however grammatical it might be, and this settled the question at once.
Upon the platform a young lady, in pink muslin and spangles and fleshings, with a crown upon her head, and many rows of curious beads around her neck, was marching solemnly to and fro, to an old ballad melody which a fellow in a bowler hat was twisting out of an organ, and to which he was keeping time on a very hard drum.
Strutting backwards and forwards also, sometimes before the young lady in muslin and sometimes behind her, was a gaunt, greyish-looking dog, dressed up in military costume, and occasionally stopping to go through little bits of military exercise.
Three flaming and spluttering naphtha lamps cast a flickering uncertain light upon the singular scene, making the surrounding darkness all the darker.
By-and-by the man at the organ laid down his drum-stick, and, taking up a long whip, came to the top of the ladder, and after cracking the whip in a grave, solemn sort of fashion, he struck the spangled lady in the picture, and said in a loud voice,—
“Now, ladies and gentlemen, be in time, be in time! there be no time to lose! we be just a-goin’ to commence! The mysterious Lady of the North and the hemmernent Wizard—the greatest wonder in Europe! The wonderful basket trick, or the mysterious secret, is pronounced by all who ’ave seen it to be the greatest feat——”
There is no knowing how much more the speaker would have said concerning the marvels of this famous exhibition had he not been interrupted by three terrible screams, one following the other in rapid and startling succession, and uttered by a stout woman in the crowd, who was looking up at Dibble and fighting the air above her head with two very short arms in a most alarming manner.
“Oh, here’s a lark—the old woman’s drunk,” said a boy, throwing his hat up into the drizzly, mizzly air.
“Pat her on the back,” said an excited woman with a baby in her arms.
“Let me alone—let me alone!” at length Mrs. Dibble exclaimed, beating her way through the crowd, and mounting the Temple steps amidst roars of laughter and shouts of applause.
The gentleman with the whip became suddenly very much agitated, and when he saw the woman approaching the platform, he fairly turned round and bolted into the Temple.
Seeing this, a crowd rushed up after the old lady; but “Christabel,” the showman’s daughter, seized the whip which Dibble had dropped, called “Father” lustily, and began to defend the pass.
Digby Martin appeared in his shirt-sleeves, and in an instant struck a splendid fighting attitude in face of the intruders, which caused a number of them to change their minds, and produced from others sundry coppers which entitled them to admission.
When they were inside, Paul amongst the number, they saw a gorgeous array of tinselled cups and vases arranged on a black velvet dais, with a shimmering wheel revolving in the background, Mr. Dibble leaning over the stout woman and calling frantically for somebody to bring him some water, whilst the renowned Momus was jumping round the pair and barking in a most unmilitary fashion.
Before there was time for Dibble’s calls for water to receive any attention, Mrs. Dibble looked up and requested Thomas, “dear Thomas,” to conduct her to a private room, at which there were renewed shouts of laughter.
Paul Somerton was fain to keep in the background, for he was getting rather ashamed of the unexpected turn which affairs were taking. Dibble said a few hurried words to the showman, and then, taking Mrs. Dibble by the arm, disappeared at the side-door.
The audience made a rush to follow, but Digby Martin, the magician, placed himself before the doorway and informed them that he could assure them there was no more fun to be had out of the lady and gentleman who had just retired, and that he would show them something ten times funnier than what they had just seen; whereupon Paul quietly took his leave, and made the best of his way to the Railway Tavern, where he found Mrs. Dibble had just arrived with her husband.
Mrs. Dibble was in tears, and Dibble was talking to her rather loudly and in an authoritative tone; but half an hour afterwards they were all sitting quietly down to refreshment, and Mrs. Dibble’s journey having ended in finding her husband, Paul now proposed to leave them in order to catch the mail for Avonworth.
Mrs. Dibble thanked him for his kindness, and said she had no further need, she thought, to trespass upon him; so he bade them adieu, and went off laughing to the railway station.