The Lunatic at Large Part 38

First casting a wary eye upon a chair, Mr Duggs seated himself carefully on the edge of it.

"It is quite evident," thought Mr Bunker, "that he has spotted something wrong. I believe a bobby would have been safer after all."

He a.s.sumed the longest face he could draw, and remarked sententiously, "The weather has been unpleasantly cold of late, Mr Duggs."

He flattered himself that his guest seemed instantly more at his ease.

Certainly he replied with as much cordiality as a man with such a dull eye could be supposed to display.

"It has, Mr Butler; in fact I have suffered from a chill for some weeks.

Ahem!"

"Have something to drink," suggested Mr Bunker, sympathetically. "I'm trying a little whisky myself, as a cure for cold."

"I-ah-I am sorry. I do not touch spirits."

"I, on the contrary, am glad to hear it. Too few of our clergymen nowadays support the cause of temperance by example."

Mr Bunker felt a little natural pride in this happily expressed sentiment, but his visitor merely turned his cold eye on the whisky bottle, and breathed heavily.

"Confound him!" he thought; "I'll give him something to snort at if he is going to conduct himself like this."

"Have a cigar?" he asked aloud.

Mr Duggs seemed to regard the cigar-box a little less unkindly than the whisky bottle; but after a careful look at it he replied, "I am afraid they seem a little too strong for me. I am a light smoker, Mr Butler."

"Really," smiled Mr Bunker; "so many virtues in one room reminds me of the virgins of Gomorrah."

"I beg your pardon? The what?" asked Mr Duggs, with a startled stare.

Mr Bunker suspected that he had made a slip in his biblical reminiscences, but he continued to smile imperturbably, and inquired with a perfect air of surprise, "Haven't you read the novel I referred to?"

Mr Duggs appeared a little relieved, but he answered blankly enough, "I-ah-have not. What is the book you refer to?"

"Oh, don't you know? To tell the truth, I forget the t.i.tle. It's by a somewhat well-known lady writer of religious fiction. A Miss-her name escapes me at this moment."

In fact, as Mr Bunker had no idea how long his friend might be dwelling in the apartment immediately above him, he thought it more prudent to make no statement that could possibly be checked.

"I am no great admirer of religious fiction of any kind," replied Mr Duggs, "particularly that written by emotional females."

"No," said Mr Bunker, pleasantly; "I should imagine your own doctrines were not apt to err on the sentimental side."

"I am not aware that I have said anything to you about my-doctrines, as you call them, Mr Butler."

"Still, don't you think one can generally tell a man's creed from his coat, and his sympathies from the way he c.o.c.ks his hat?"

"I think," replied Mr Duggs, "that our ideas of our vocation are somewhat different."

"Mine is, I admit," said Mr Bunker, who had come to the conclusion that the strain of playing his part was really too great, and was now being happily carried along by his tongue.

Mr Duggs for a moment was evidently disposed to give battle, but thinking better of it, he contented himself with frowning at his younger opponent, and abruptly changed the subject.

"May I ask what position you hold in the church, Mr Butler?"

"Why," began Mr Bunker, lightly: it was on the tip of his tongue to say "a clergyman, of course," when he suddenly recollected that he might be anything from the rank of curate up to the people who wear gaiters (and who these were precisely he didn't know). An ingenious solution suggested itself. He replied with a preliminary inquiry, "Have you ever been in the East, Mr Duggs?"

"I regret to say I have not hitherto had the opportunity."

"Thank the Lord for that," thought Mr Bunker. "I have been a missionary,"

he said quietly, and looked dreamily into the fire.

It was a happy move. Mr Duggs was visibly impressed.

"Ah?" he said. "Indeed? I am much interested to learn this, Mr Butler.

It-ah-gives me perhaps a somewhat different view of your-ah-opinions.

Where did your work lie?"

"China," replied Mr Bunker, thinking it best to keep as far abroad as possible.

"Ha!" exclaimed Mr Duggs. "This is really extremely fortunate. I am at present, Mr Butler, studying the religions and customs of China at the British Museum, with a view to going out there myself very shortly. I already feel I know almost as much about that most interesting country as if I had lived there. I should like to talk with you at some length on the subject."

Mr Bunker saw that it was time to put an end to this conversation, at whatever minor risk of perturbing his visitor. He had been a little alarmed, too, by noticing that Mr Duggs' dull eye had wandered frequently to his theological library, which with his usual foresight he had strewn conspicuously on the table, and that any expression it had was rather of suspicious curiosity than gratification.

"I should like to hear some of your experiences," Mr Duggs continued. "In what province did you work?"

"In Hung Hang Ho," replied Mr Bunker. His visitor looked puzzled, but he continued boldly, "My experiences were somewhat unpleasant. I became engaged to a mandarin's daughter-a charming girl. I was suspected, however, of abetting an illicit traffic in Chinese lanterns. My companions were manicured alive, and I only made my escape in a paG.o.da, or a junk-I was in too much of a hurry to notice which-at the imminent peril of my life. Don't go to China, Mr Duggs."

Mr Duggs rose.

"Young man," he said, sternly, "put away that fatal bottle. I can only suppose that it is under the influence of drink that you have ventured to tell me such an irreverent and impossible story."

"Sir," began Mr Bunker, warmly,-for he thought that an outburst of indignation would probably be the safest way of concluding the interview,-when he stopped abruptly and listened. All the time his ears had been alive to anything going on outside, and now he heard a cab rattle up and stop close by. It might be at Dr Twiddel's, he thought, and, turning from his visitor, he sprang to the window.

Remarking distantly, "I hear a cab; it is possibly a friend I am expecting," Mr Duggs stepped to the other window.

It was only, however, a hansom at the door of the next house, out of which a very golden-haired young lady was stepping. "Aha," said Mr Bunker, quite forgetting the indignant _role_ he had begun to play; "rather nice! Is this your friend, Mr Duggs?"

Mr Duggs gave him one look of his dull eyes, and walked straight for the door. As he went out he merely remarked, "Our acquaintance has been brief, Mr Butler, but it has been quite sufficient."

"Quite," thought Mr Bunker.

CHAPTER III.

That was Mr Bunker's first and last meeting with the Rev. John Duggs, and he took no small credit to himself for having so effectually incensed his neighbour, without, at the same time, bringing suspicion on anything more pertinent than his sobriety.

And yet sometimes in the course of the next three days he would have been thankful to see him again, if only to have another pa.s.sage-of-arms. The time pa.s.sed most wearily; the consulting-room blinds were never raised; no cabs stopped before the doctor's door; n.o.body except the little servant ever moved about the house.