Scally.

by Ian Hay.

I

"BETTERSEA trem? Right, miss!" My wife, who has been married long enough to feel deeply gratified at being mistaken for a maiden lady, smiled seraphically at the conductor, and allowed herself to be hoisted up the steps of the majestic vehicle provided by a paternal county council to convey pa.s.sengers--at a loss to the ratepayers, I understand--from the Embankment to Battersea.

Presently we ground our way round a curve and began to cross Westminster Bridge. The conductor, whose innate c.o.c.kney bonhomie his high official position had failed to eradicate, presented himself before us and collected our fares.

"What part of Bettersea did you require, sir?" he asked of me.

I coughed and answered evasively:--

"Oh, about the middle."

"We haven't been there before," added my wife, quite gratuitously.

The conductor smiled indulgently and punched our tickets.

"I'll tell you when to get down," he said, and left us.

For some months we had been considering the question of buying a dog, and a good deal of our spare time--or perhaps I should say of my spare time, for a woman's time is naturally all her own--had been pleasantly occupied in discussing the matter. Having at length committed ourselves to the purchase of the animal, we proceeded to consider such details as breed, s.e.x, and age.

My wife vacillated between a bloodhound, because bloodhounds are so aristocratic in appearance, and a Pekinese, because they are _dernier cri_. We like to be _dernier cri_ even in Much Moreham. Her younger sister, Eileen, who spends a good deal of time with us, having no parents of her own, suggested an Old English sheep dog, explaining that it would be company for my wife when I was away from home. I coldly recommended a mastiff.

Our son John, aged three, on being consulted, expressed a preference for twelve tigers in a box, and was not again invited to partic.i.p.ate in the debate.

Finally we decided on an Aberdeen terrier, of an age and s.e.x to be settled by circ.u.mstances, and I was instructed to communicate with a gentleman in the North who advertised in our morning paper that Aberdeen terriers were his specialty. In due course we received a reply. The advertiser recommended two animals--namely, Celtic Chief, aged four months, and Scotia's Pride, aged one year. Pedigrees were inclosed, each about as complicated as the family tree of the House of Hapsburg; and the favor of an early reply was requested, as both dogs were being hotly bid for by an anonymous client in Constantinople.

The price of Celtic Chief was twenty guineas; that of Scotia's Pride, for reasons heavily underlined in the pedigree, was twenty-seven. The advertiser, who resided in Aberdeen, added that these prices did not cover cost of carriage. We decided not to stand in the way of the gentleman in Constantinople, and having sent back the pedigrees by return of post, resumed the debate.

Finally Stella, my wife, said:--

"We don't really want a dog with a pedigree. We only want something that will bark at beggars and be gentle with baby. Why not go to the Home for Lost Dogs at Battersea? I believe you can get any dog you like there for five shillings. We will run up to town next Wednesday and see about it--and I might get some clothes as well."

Hence our presence on the tram.

Presently the conductor, who had kindly pointed out to us such objects of local interest as the River Thames and the Houses of Parliament, stopped the tram in a crowded thoroughfare and announced that we were in Battersea.

"Alight here," he announced facetiously, "for 'Ome for Lost Dawgs!"

Guiltily realizing that there is many a true word spoken in jest, we obeyed him, and the tram went rocking and whizzing out of sight. We had eschewed a cab.

"When you are only going to pay five shillings for a dog," my wife had pointed out, with convincing logic, "it is silly to go and pay perhaps another five shillings for a cab. It doubles the price of the dog at once. If we had been buying an expensive dog we might have taken a cab; but not for a five-shilling one."

"Now," I inquired briskly, "how are we going to find this place?"

"Haven't you any idea where it is?"

"No. I have a sort of vague notion that it is on an island in the middle of the river, called the Isle of Dogs, or Barking Reach, or something like that. However, I have no doubt--"

"Hadn't we better ask some one?" suggested Stella.

I demurred.

"If there is one thing I dislike," I said, "it is accosting total strangers and badgering them for information they don't possess--not that that will prevent them from giving it. If we start asking the way we shall find ourselves in Putney or Woolwich in no time!"

"Yes, dear," said Stella soothingly.

"Now I suggest--" My hand went to my pocket.

"No, darling," interposed my wife, hastily; "not a map, please!" It is a curious psychological fact that women have a const.i.tutional aversion to maps and railroad time-tables. They would rather consult a half-witted errand boy or a deaf railroad porter. "Do not let us make a spectacle of ourselves in the public streets again! I have not yet forgotten the day when you tried to find the Crystal Palace. Besides, it will only blow away. Ask that dear little boy there. He is looking at us so wistfully."

Yes; I admit it was criminal folly. A man who asks a London street boy to be so kind as to direct him to a Home for Lost Dogs has only himself to thank for the consequence.

The wistful little boy smiled up at us. He had a pinched face and large eyes.

"Lost Dogs' 'Ome, sir?" he said courteously. "It's a good long way. Do you want to get there quick?"

"Yes."

"Then if I was you, sir," replied the infant, edging to the mouth of an alleyway, "I should bite a policeman!" And, with an ear-splitting yell, he vanished.

We walked on, hot-faced.

"Little wretch!" said Stella.

"We simply asked for it," I rejoined. "What are we going to do next?"

My question was answered in a most incredible fashion, for at this moment a man emerged from a shop on our right and set off down the street before us. He wore a species of uniform; and emblazoned on the front of his hat was the information that he was an official of the Battersea Home for Lost and Starving Dogs.

"Wait a minute and I will ask him," I said, starting forward.

But my wife would not hear of it.

"Certainly not," she replied. "If we ask him he will simply offer to show us the way. Then we shall have to talk to him--about hydrophobia, and lethal chambers, and distemper--and it may be for miles. I simply couldn't bear it! We shall have to tip him, too. Let us follow him quietly."

To those who have never attempted to track a fellow creature surrept.i.tiously through the streets of London on a hot day, the feat may appear simple. It is in reality a most exhausting, dilatory, and humiliating exercise. Our difficulty lay not so much in keeping our friend in sight as in avoiding frequent and unexpected collisions with him. The general idea, as they say on field days, was to keep about twenty yards behind him; but under certain circ.u.mstances distance has an uncanny habit of annihilating itself. The man himself was no hustler.

Once or twice he stopped to light his pipe or converse with a friend.

During these interludes Stella and I loafed guiltily on the pavement, pointing out to one another objects of local interest with the fatuous officiousness of people in the foreground of hotel advertis.e.m.e.nts.

Occasionally he paused to contemplate the contents of a shop window. We gazed industriously into the window next door. Our first window, I recollect, was an undertaker's, with ready-printed expressions of grief for sale on white porcelain disks. We had time to read them all. The next was a butcher's. Here we stayed, perforce, so long that the proprietor, who was of the tribe that disposes of its wares almost entirely by personal canva.s.s, came out into the street and endeavored to sell us a bullock's heart.

Our quarry's next proceeding was to dive into a public house. We turned and surveyed one another.

"What are we to do now?" inquired my wife.