第54章 MR. BRISHER'S TREASURE(1)

"You can't be TOO careful WHO you marry," said Mr. Brisher, and pulled thoughtfully with a fat-wristed hand at the lank moustache that hides his want of chin.

"That's why--" I ventured.

"Yes," said Mr. Brisher, with a solemn light in his bleary, blue-grey eyes, moving his head expressively and breathing alcohol INTIMATELY at me. "There's lots as 'ave 'ad a try at me--many as I could name in this town--but none 'ave done it--none."

I surveyed the flushed countenance, the equatorial expansion, the masterly carelessness of his attire, and heaved a sigh to think that by reason of the unworthiness of women he must needs be the last of his race.

"I was a smart young chap when I was younger," said Mr. Brisher.

"I 'ad my work cut out. But I was very careful--very. And I got through . . ."

He leant over the taproom table and thought visibly on the subject of my trustworthiness. I was relieved at last by his confidence.

"I was engaged once," he said at last, with a reminiscent eye on the shuv-a'penny board.

"So near as that?"

He looked at me. "So near as that. Fact is--" He looked about him, brought his face close to mine, lowered his voice, and fenced off an unsympathetic world with a grimy hand. "If she ain't dead or married to some one else or anything--I'm engaged still. Now." He confirmed this statement with nods and facial contortions. "STILL," he said, ending the pantomime, and broke into a reckless smile at my surprise.

"ME!"

"Run away," he explained further, with coruscating eyebrows.

"Come 'ome.

"That ain't all.

"You'd 'ardly believe it," he said, "but I found a treasure. Found a regular treasure."

I fancied this was irony, and did not, perhaps, greet it with proper surprise. "Yes," he said, "I found a treasure. And come 'ome. I tell you I could surprise you with things that has happened to me."

And for some time he was content to repeat that he had found a treasure--and left it.

I made no vulgar clamour for a story, but I became attentive to Mr. Brisher's bodily needs, and presently I led him back to the deserted lady.

"She was a nice girl," he said--a little sadly, I thought. "AND respectable."

He raised his eyebrows and tightened his mouth to express extreme respectability--beyond the likes of us elderly men.

"It was a long way from 'ere. Essex, in fact. Near Colchester.

It was when I was up in London--in the buildin' trade. I was a smart young chap then, I can tell you. Slim. 'Ad best clo'es 's good as anybody. 'At--SILK 'at, mind you." Mr. Brisher's hand shot above his head towards the infinite to indicate it silk hat of the highest.

"Umbrella--nice umbrella with a 'orn 'andle. Savin's. Very careful I was. . . ."

He was pensive for a little while, thinking, as we must all come to think sooner or later, of the vanished brightness of youth.

But he refrained, as one may do in taprooms, from the obvious moral.

"I got to know 'er through a chap what was engaged to 'er sister.

She was stopping in London for a bit with an aunt that 'ad a 'am an' beef shop. This aunt was very particular--they was all very particular people, all 'er people was--and wouldn't let 'er sister go out with this feller except 'er other sister, MY girl that is, went with them. So 'e brought me into it, sort of to ease the crowding.

We used to go walks in Battersea Park of a Sunday afternoon. Me in my topper, and 'im in 'is; and the girl's--well--stylish. There wasn't many in Battersea Park 'ad the larf of us. She wasn't what you'd call pretty, but a nicer girl I never met. _I _ liked 'er from the start, and, well--though I say it who shouldn't--she liked me.

You know 'ow it is, I dessay?"

I pretended I did.

"And when this chap married 'er sister--'im and me was great friends--what must 'e do but arst me down to Colchester, close by where She lived. Naturally I was introjuced to 'er people, and well, very soon, her and me was engaged."

He repeated "engaged."

"She lived at 'ome with 'er father and mother, quite the lady, in a very nice little 'ouse with a garden--and remarkable respectable people they was. Rich you might call 'em a'most. They owned their own 'ouse--got it out of the Building Society, and cheap because the chap who had it before was a burglar and in prison--and they 'ad a bit of free'old land, and some cottages and money 'nvested--all nice and tight: they was what you'd call snug and warm. I tell you, I was On. Furniture too. Why! They 'ad a pianner. Jane--'er name was Jane--used to play it Sundays, and very nice she played too.

There wasn't 'ardly a 'im toon in the book she COULDN'T play . . .

"Many's the evenin' we've met and sung 'ims there, me and 'er and the family.

"'Er father was quite a leadin' man in chapel. You should ha' seen him Sundays, interruptin' the minister and givin' out 'ims. He had gold spectacles, I remember, and used to look over 'em at you while he sang hearty--he was always great on singing 'earty to the Lord--and when HE got out o' toon 'arf the people went after 'im--always.

'E was that sort of man. And to walk be'ind 'im in 'is nice black clo'es--'is 'at was a brimmer--made one regular proud to be engaged to such a father-in-law. And when the summer came I went down there and stopped a fortnight.

"Now, you know there was a sort of Itch," said Mr. Brisher. "We wanted to marry, me and Jane did, and get things settled. But 'E said I 'ad to get a proper position first. Consequently there was a Itch.

Consequently, when I went down there, I was anxious to show that I was a good useful sort of chap like. Show I could do pretty nearly everything like. See?"

I made a sympathetic noise.

"And down at the bottom of their garden was a bit of wild part like.

So I says to 'im, 'Why don't you 'ave a rockery 'ere?' I says.

'It 'ud look nice.'

"'Too much expense,' he says.

"'Not a penny,' says I. 'I'm a dab at rockeries. Lemme make you one.'