The Brass Bottle, F. Anstey [e book reader for pc TXT] 📗

an improved system of education, at least eighty per cent. of our juvenile population are now enabled to appreciate.

"I want to see Mr. Dilger," he began.

"You can't," said the youth. "'Cause he ain't in. He's attending of an auction."

"When will he be in, do you know?"

"Might be back to his tea—but I wasn't to expect him not before supper."

"You don't happen to have any old metal bottles—copper or—or brass would do—for sale?"

"You don't git at me like that! Bottles is made o' glorss."

"Well, a jar, then—a big brass pot—anything of that kind?"

"Don't keep 'em," said the boy, and buried himself once more in his copy of "Spicy Sniggers."

"I'll just look round," said Horace, and began to poke about with a sinking heart, and a horrid dread that he might have come to the wrong shop, for the big pot-bellied vessel certainly did not seem to be there. At last, to his unspeakable joy, he discovered it under a piece of tattered drugget. "Why, this is the sort of thing I meant," he said, feeling in his pocket and discovering that he had exactly a sovereign. "How much do you want for it?"

"I dunno," said the boy.

"I don't mind three shillings," said Horace, who did not wish to appear too keen at first.

"I'll tell the guv'nor when he comes in," was the reply, "and you can look in later."

"I want it at once," insisted Horace. "Come, I'll give you three-and-six for it."

[Pg 214]

"It's more than it's wurf," replied the candid youth.

"Perhaps," said Horace, "but I'm rather pressed for time. If you'll change this sovereign, I'll take the bottle away with me."

"You seem uncommon anxious to get 'old on it, mister!" said the boy, with sudden suspicion.

"Nonsense!" said Horace. "I live close by, and I thought I might as well take it, that's all."

"Oh, if that's all, you can wait till the guv'nor's in."

"I—I mayn't be passing this way again for some time," said Horace.

"Bound to be, if you live close by," and the provoking youth returned to his "Sniggers."

"Do you call this attending to your master's business?" said Horace. "Listen to me, you young rascal. I'll give you five shillings for it. You're not going to be fool enough to refuse an offer like that?"

"I ain't goin' to be fool enough to refuse it—nor yet I ain't goin' to be fool enough to take it, 'cause I'm only 'ere to see as nobody don't come in and sneak fings. I ain't got no authority to sell anyfink, and I don't know the proice o' nuffink, so there you 'ave it."

"Take the five shillings," said Horace, "and if it's too little I'll come round and settle with your master later."

"I thought you said you wasn't likely to be porsin' again? No, mister, you don't kid me that way!"

Horace had a mad impulse to snatch up the precious bottle then and there and make off with it, and might have yielded to the temptation, with disastrous consequences, had not an elderly man entered the shop at that moment. He was bent, and wore rather more fluff and flue upon his person than most well-dressed people would consider necessary, but he came in with a certain air of authority, nevertheless.

"Mr. Dilger, sir," piped the youth, "'ere's a gent took a fancy to this 'ere brass pot o' yours. Says he must 'ave it. Five shillings he'd got to, but I told him he'd 'ave to wait till you come in."

[Pg 215]

"Quite right, my lad!" said Mr. Dilger, cocking a watery but sharp old eye at Horace. "Five shillings! Ah, sir, you can't know much about these hold brass antiquities to make an orfer like that."

"I know as much as most people," said Horace. "But let us say six shillings."

"Couldn't be done, sir; couldn't indeed. Why, I give a pound for it myself at Christie's, as sure as I'm standin' 'ere in the presence o' my Maker, and you a sinner!" he declared impressively, if rather ambiguously.

"Your memory is not quite accurate," said Horace. "You bought it last night from a man of the name of Rapkin, who lets lodgings in Vincent Square, and you paid exactly half a crown for it."

"If you say so I dare say it's correct, sir," said Mr. Dilger, without exhibiting the least confusion. "And if I did buy it off Mr. Rapkin, he's a respectable party, and ain't likely to have come by it dishonest."

"I never said he did. What will you take for the thing?"

"Well, just look at the work in it. They don't turn out the like o' that nowadays. Dutch, that is; what they used for to put their milk and such-like in."

"Damn it!" said Horace, completely losing his temper. "I know what it was used for. Will you tell me what you want for it?"

"I couldn't let a curiosity like that go a penny under thirty shillings," said Mr. Dilger, affectionately. "It would be robbin' myself."

"I'll give you a sovereign for it—there," said Horace. "You know best what profit that represents. That's my last word."

"My last word to that, sir, is good hevenin'," said the worthy man.

"Good evening, then," said Horace, and walked out of the shop; rather to bring Mr. Dilger to terms than because he really meant to abandon the bottle, for he[Pg 216] dared not go back without it, and he had nothing about him just then on which he could raise the extra ten shillings, supposing the dealer refused to trust him for the balance—and the time was growing dangerously short.

Fortunately the well-worn ruse succeeded, for Mr. Dilger ran out after him and laid an unwashed claw upon his coat-sleeve. "Don't go, mister," he said; "I like to do business if I can; though, 'pon my word and honour, a sovereign for a work o' art like that! Well, just for luck and bein' my birthday, we'll call it a deal."

Horace handed over the coin, which left him with a few pence. "There ought to be a lid or stopper of some sort," he said suddenly. "What have you done with that?"

"No, sir, there you're mistook, you are, indeed. I do assure you you never see a pot of this partickler pattern with a lid to it. Never!"

"Oh, don't you, though?" said Horace. "I know better. Never mind," he said, as he recollected that the seal was in Fakrash's possession. "I'll take it as it is. Don't trouble to wrap it up. I'm in rather a hurry."

It was almost dark when he got back to his rooms, where he found the Jinnee shaking with mingled rage and apprehension.

"No welcome to thee!" he cried. "Dilatory dog that thou art! Hadst thou delayed another minute, I would have called down some calamity upon thee."

"Well, you need not trouble yourself to do that now," returned Ventimore. "Here's your bottle, and you can creep into it as soon as you please."

"But the seal!" shrieked the Jinnee. "What hast thou done with the seal which was upon the bottle?"

"Why, you've got it yourself, of course," said Horace, "in one of your pockets."

"O thou of base antecedents!" howled Fakrash, shaking out his flowing draperies. "How should I have[Pg 217] the seal? This is but a fresh device of thine to undo me!"

"Don't talk rubbish!" retorted Horace. "You made the Professor give it up to you yesterday. You must have lost it somewhere or other. Never mind! I'll get a large cork or bung, which will do just as well. And I've lots of sealing-wax."

"I will have no seal but the seal of Suleyman!" declared the Jinnee. "For with no other will there be security. Verily I believe that that accursed sage, thy friend, hath contrived by some cunning to get the seal once more into his hands. I will go at once to his abode and compel him to restore it."

"I wouldn't," said Horace, feeling extremely uneasy, for it was evidently a much simpler thing to let a Jinnee out of a bottle than to get him in again. "He's quite incapable of taking it. And if you go out now you'll only make a fuss and attract the attention of the Press, which I thought you rather wanted to avoid."

"I shall attire myself in the garments of a mortal—even those I assumed on a former occasion," said Fakrash, and as he spoke his outer robes modernised into a frock-coat. "Thus shall I escape attention."

"Wait one moment," said Horace. "What is that bulge in your breast-pocket?"

"Of a truth," said the Jinnee, looking relieved but not a little foolish as he extracted the object, "it is indeed the seal."

"You're in such a hurry to think the worst of everybody, you see!" said Horace. "Now, do try to carry away with you into your seclusion a better opinion of human nature."

"Perdition to all the people of this age!" cried Fakrash, re-assuming his green robe and turban, "for I now put no faith in human beings and would afflict them all, were not the Lord Mayor (on whom be peace!) mightier than I. Therefore, while it is yet time, take thou the stopper, and swear that, after I am in this[Pg 218] bottle, thou wilt seal it as before and cast it into deep waters, where no eye will look upon it more!"

"With all the pleasure in the world!" said Horace; "only you must keep your part of the bargain first. You will kindly obliterate all recollection of yourself and the brass bottle from the minds of every human being who has had anything to do with you or it."

"Not so," objected the Jinnee, "for thus wouldst thou forget thy compact."

"Oh, very well, leave me out, then," said Horace. "Not that anything could make me forget you!"

Fakrash swept his right hand round in a half circle. "It is accomplished," he said. "All recollection of myself and yonder bottle is now erased from the memories of every one but thyself."

"But how about my client?" said Horace. "I can't afford to lose him, you know."

"He shall return unto thee," said the Jinnee, trembling with impatience. "Now perform thy share."

Horace had triumphed. It had been a long and desperate duel with this singular being, who was at once so crafty and so childlike, so credulous and so suspicious, so benevolent and so malign. Again and again he had despaired of victory, but he had won at last. In another minute or so this formidable Jinnee would be safely bottled once more, and powerless to intermeddle and plague him for the future.

And yet, in the very moment of triumph, quixotic as such scruples may seem to some, Ventimore's conscience smote him. He could not help a certain pity for the old creature, who was shaking there convulsively prepared to re-enter his bottle-prison rather than incur a wholly imaginary doom. Fakrash had aged visibly within the last hour; now he looked even older than his three thousand and odd years. True, he had led Horace a fearful life of late, but at first, at least, his intentions had been good. His gratitude, if mistaken in its form, was the sign of a generous disposition. Not every Jinnee,[Pg 219] surely, would have endeavoured to press untold millions and honours and dignities of all kinds upon him, in return for a service which most mortals would have considered amply repaid by a brace of birds and an invitation to an evening party.

And how was Horace treating him? He was taking what, in his heart, he felt to be a rather mean advantage of the Jinnee's ignorance of modern life to cajole him into returning to his captivity. Why not suffer him to live out the brief remainder of his years (for he could hardly last more than another century or two at most) in freedom? Fakrash had learnt his lesson: he was not likely to interfere again in human affairs; he might find his way back to the Palace of the Mountain of the Clouds and end his days there, in peaceful enjoyment of the society of such of the Jinn as might still survive unbottled.

So, obeying—against his own interests—some kindlier impulse, Horace made an effort to deter the Jinnee, who was already hovering in air above the neck of the bottle in a swirl of revolving draperies, like some blundering old bee vainly endeavouring to hit the opening into his hive.

"Mr. Fakrash," he cried, "before you go any farther, listen to me. There's no real necessity, after all, for you to go back to your bottle. If you'll only wait a little——"

But the Jinnee, who had now swelled to gigantic proportions, and whose form and features