Tommy and Co.

“I take it you’ve fixed things up all right for yourself,” said Mrs. Postwhistle; “and nobody can blame you if you ’ave. ’Eaven bless you, is what I say.”

“We shall get on together,” prophesied Mr. Clodd. “I’m fond of animals.”

Early the next morning a four-wheeled cab drew up at the entrance to Rolls Court, and in it and upon it went away Clodd and Clodd’s Lunatic (as afterwards he came to be known), together with all the belongings of Clodd’s Lunatic, the curtain-pole included; and there appeared again behind the fanlight of the little grocer’s shop the intimation: “Lodgings for a Single Man,” which caught the eye a few days later of a weird-looking, lanky, rawboned laddie, whose language Mrs. Postwhistle found difficulty for a time in comprehending; and that is why one sometimes meets to-day worshippers of Kail Yard literature wandering disconsolately about St. Dunstan-in-the-West, seeking Rolls Court, discomforted because it is no more. But that is the history of the “Wee Laddie,” and this of the beginnings of William Clodd, now Sir William Clodd, Bart., M.P., proprietor of a quarter of a hundred newspapers, magazines, and journals: “Truthful Billy” we called him then.

No one can say of Clodd that he did not deserve whatever profit his unlicensed lunatic asylum may have brought him. A kindly man was William Clodd when indulgence in sentiment did not interfere with business.

“There’s no harm in him,” asserted Mr. Clodd, talking the matter over with one Mr. Peter Hope, journalist, of Gough Square. “He’s just a bit dotty, same as you or I might get with nothing to do and all day long to do it in. Kid’s play, that’s all it is. The best plan, I find, is to treat it as a game and take a hand in it. Last week he wanted to be a lion. I could see that was going to be awkward, he roaring for raw meat and thinking to prowl about the house at night. Well, I didn’t nag him – that’s no good. I just got a gun and shot him. He’s a duck now, and I’m trying to keep him one: sits for an hour beside his bath on three china eggs I’ve bought him. Wish some of the sane ones were as little trouble.”

The summer came again. Clodd and his Lunatic, a mild-looking little old gentleman of somewhat clerical cut, one often met with arm-in-arm, bustling about the streets and courts that were the scene of Clodd’s rent-collecting labours. Their evident attachment to one another was curiously displayed; Clodd, the young and red-haired, treating his white-haired, withered companion with fatherly indulgence; the other glancing up from time to time into Clodd’s face with a winning expression of infantile affection.

“We are getting much better,” explained Clodd, the pair meeting Peter Hope one day at the corner of Newcastle Street. “The more we are out in the open air, and the more we have to do and think about, the better for us – eh?”

The mild-looking little old gentleman hanging on Clodd’s arm smiled and nodded.

“Between ourselves,” added Mr. Clodd, sinking his voice, “we are not half as foolish as folks think we are.”

Peter Hope went his way down the Strand.

“Clodd’s a good sort – a good sort,” said Peter Hope, who, having in his time lived much alone, had fallen into the habit of speaking his thoughts aloud; “but he’s not the man to waste his time. I wonder.”

With the winter Clodd’s Lunatic fell ill.

Clodd bustled round to Chancery Lane.

“To tell you the truth,” confessed Mr. Gladman, “we never thought he would live so long as he has.”

“There’s the annuity you’ve got to think of,” said Clodd, whom his admirers of to-day (and they are many, for he must be a millionaire by this time) are fond of alluding to as “that frank, outspoken Englishman.” “Wouldn’t it be worth your while to try what taking him away from the fogs might do for him?”

Old Gladman seemed inclined to consider the question, but Mrs. Gladman, a brisk, cheerful little woman, had made up her mind.

“We’ve had what there is to have,” said Mrs. Gladman. “He’s seventy-three. What’s the sense of risking good money? Be content.”

No one could say – no one ever did say – that Clodd, under the circumstances, did not do his best. Perhaps, after all, nothing could have helped. The little old gentleman, at Clodd’s suggestion, played at being a dormouse and lay very still. If he grew restless, thereby bringing on his cough, Clodd, as a terrible black cat, was watching to pounce upon him. Only by keeping very quiet and artfully pretending to be asleep could he hope to escape the ruthless Clodd.

Doctor William Smith (né Wilhelm Schmidt) shrugged his fat shoulders. “We can do noding. Dese fogs of ours: id is de one ting dat enables the foreigner to crow over us. Keep him quiet. De dormouse – id is a goot idea.”

That evening William Clodd mounted to the second floor of 16, Gough Square, where dwelt his friend, Peter Hope, and knocked briskly at the door.

“Come in,” said a decided voice, which was not Peter Hope’s.

Mr. William Clodd’s ambition was, and always had been, to be the owner or part-owner of a paper. To-day, as I have said, he owns a quarter of a hundred, and is in negotiation, so rumour goes, for seven more. But twenty years ago “Clodd and Co., Limited,” was but in embryo. And Peter Hope, journalist, had likewise and for many a long year cherished the ambition to be, before he died, the owner or part-owner of a paper. Peter Hope to-day owns nothing, except perhaps the knowledge, if such things be permitted, that whenever and wherever his name is mentioned, kind thoughts arise unbidden – that someone of the party will surely say: “Dear old Peter! What a good fellow he was!” Which also may be in its way a valuable possession: who knows? But twenty years ago Peter’s horizon was limited by Fleet Street.

Peter Hope was forty-seven, so he said, a dreamer and a scholar. William Clodd was three-and-twenty, a born hustler, very wide awake. Meeting one day by accident upon an omnibus, when Clodd lent Peter, who had come out without his purse, threepence to pay his fare with; drifting into acquaintanceship, each had come to acquire a liking and respect for the other. The dreamer thought with wonder of Clodd’s shrewd practicability; the cute young man of business was lost in admiration of what seemed to him his old friend’s marvellous learning. Both had arrived at the conclusion that a weekly journal with Peter Hope as editor, and William Clodd as manager, would be bound to be successful.

“If only we could scrape together a thousand pounds!” had sighed Peter.

“The moment we lay our hands upon the coin, we’ll start that paper. Remember, it’s a bargain,” had answered William Clodd.

Mr. William Clodd turned the handle and walked in. With the door still in his hand he paused to look round the room. It was the first time he had seen it. His meetings hitherto with Peter Hope had been chance rencontres in street or restaurant. Always had he been curious to view the sanctuary of so much erudition.

A large, oak-panelled room, its three high windows, each with a low, cushioned seat beneath it, giving on to Gough Square. Thirty-five years before, Peter Hope, then a young dandy with side whiskers close-cropped and terminating just below the ear; with wavy, brown hair, giving to his fresh-complexioned face an appearance almost girlish; in cut-away blue coat, flowered waistcoat, black silk cravat secured by two gold pins chained together, and tightly strapped grey trouserings, had, aided and abetted by a fragile little lady in crinoline and much-flounced skirt, and bodice somewhat low, with corkscrew curls each movement of her head set ringing, planned and furnished it in accordance with the sober canons then in vogue, spending thereupon more than they should, as is to be expected from the young to whom the future promises all things. The fine Brussels carpet! A little too bright, had thought the shaking curls. “The colours will tone down, miss – ma’am.” The shopman knew. Only by the help of the round island underneath the massive Empire table, by excursions into untrodden corners, could Peter recollect the rainbow floor his feet had pressed when he was twenty-one. The noble bookcase, surmounted by Minerva’s bust. Really it was too expensive. But the nodding curls had been so obstinate. Peter’s silly books and papers must be put away in order; the curls did not intend to permit any excuse for untidiness. So, too, the handsome, brass-bound desk; it must be worthy of the beautiful thoughts Peter would pen upon it. The great sideboard, supported by two such angry-looking mahogany lions; it must be strong to support the weight of silver clever Peter would one day purchase to place upon it. The few oil paintings in their heavy frames. A solidly furnished, sober apartment; about it that subtle atmosphere of dignity one finds but in old rooms long undisturbed, where one seems to read upon the walls: “I, Joy and Sorrow, twain in one, have dwelt here.” One item only there was that seemed out of place among its grave surroundings – a guitar, hanging from the wall, ornamented with a ridiculous blue bow, somewhat faded.

“Mr. William Clodd?” demanded the decided voice.

Clodd started and closed the door.

“Guessed it in once,” admitted Mr. Clodd.

“I thought so,” said the decided voice. “We got your note this afternoon. Mr. Hope will be back at eight. Will you kindly hang up your hat and coat in the hall? You will find a box of cigars on the mantelpiece. Excuse my being busy. I must finish this, then I’ll talk to you.”

The owner of the decided voice went on writing. Clodd, having done as he was bid, sat himself in the easy-chair before the fire and smoked. Of the person behind the desk Mr. Clodd could see but the head and shoulders. It had black, curly hair, cut short. It’s only garment visible below the white collar and red tie might have been a boy’s jacket designed more like a girl’s, or a girl’s designed more like a boy’s; partaking of the genius of English statesmanship, it appeared to be a compromise. Mr. Clodd remarked the long, drooping lashes over the bright, black eyes.

“It’s a girl,” said Mr. Clodd to himself; “rather a pretty girl.”

Mr. Clodd, continuing downward, arrived at the nose.

“No,” said Mr. Clodd to himself, “it’s a boy – a cheeky young beggar, I should say.”

The person at the desk, giving a grunt of satisfaction, gathered together sheets of manuscript and arranged them; then, resting its elbows on the desk and taking its head between its hands, regarded Mr. Clodd.

“Don’t you hurry yourself,” said Mr. Clodd; “but when you really have finished, tell me what you think of me.”

“I beg your pardon,” apologised the person at the desk. “I have got into a habit of staring at people. I know it’s rude. I’m trying to break myself of it.”

“Tell me your name,” suggested Mr. Clodd, “and I’ll forgive you.”

“Tommy,” was the answer – “I mean Jane.”

“Make up your mind,” advised Mr. Clodd; “don’t let me influence you. I only want the truth.”

“You see,” explained the person at the desk, “everybody calls me Tommy, because that used to be my name. But now it’s Jane.”

“I see,” said Mr. Clodd. “And which am I to call you?”

The person at the desk pondered. “Well, if this scheme you and Mr. Hope have been talking about really comes to anything, we shall be a good deal thrown together, you see, and then I expect you’ll call me Tommy – most people do.”

“You’ve heard about the scheme? Mr. Hope has told you?”

“Why, of course,” replied Tommy. “I’m Mr. Hope’s devil.”

For the moment Clodd doubted whether his old friend had not started a rival establishment to his own.

“I help him in his work,” Tommy relieved his mind by explaining. “In journalistic circles we call it devilling.”

“I understand,” said Mr. Clodd. “And what do you think, Tommy, of the scheme? I may as well start calling you Tommy, because, between you and me, I think the idea will come to something.”

Tommy fixed her black eyes upon him. She seemed to be looking him right through.