Uncle Thomas form America

Otago Witness, Issue 3327, 19 December 1917, Page 61

Uncle Thomas form America

rLSfleicher

The landlord of the White Elephant in Marcaster had no idea as to who the elderly gentleman was who came to his house early in the forenoon of Christmas Eve with a request to be accommodated with the best rooms in'that old-fashioned country-town hotel. But, judging by his appearance, his clothes, and the piles of luggage which presently came up from the station, he was Somebody. He certainly entered- a name, and an address, in, the 'hotel book —Mr White, - (London, — though that conveyed little; but live Lords, said the landlady, sometimes went about secret-like, calling themselves Mr Smith and Mr Brown. Not that this gentleman looked quite like a live Lord, as live Lords are depicted in the storybooks. His garments were of the best; his watch-chain was evidently of pure gold; he sported a fine diamond in his cravat and wore another on his finger; but he himself was a plain-featured man, and he was not precisely English in speech. Nevertheless, he was quite evidently a desirable guest from the financial aspect, and the landlady bustled about his rooms, and the landlord readily joined in a suggestion that he should take a drink with the newcomer in the bar. "My respects, sir, and a merry Christmas when it comes to-morrow," said the landlord. "Ever been in these- parts before, sir? You'll excuse me, but p'raps we've had the pleasure of seeing you previous like? There's so many gentlemen comes here the one way or another." "Well, I guess you ain't eeen me, anyway," answered Mr White. "Leastways, taking you to be a man of forty, it would be when you were in your cradle if you did. I was in these parts some forty years ago, and I ain't been in 'em since. Now, do you 'happen to know any people round this country of the name of Mallows?"

responded the landlord. "George Mallows, out at Oakdale —know him well enough—in here every market day—farmer. Relative o' yours, sir?" "My name's White from London," said the visitor. "This George Mallows, farmer, now—is he doing well?" The landlord rubbed his chin with a thoughtful expression. "Well, you know what farmers is, sir," he replied. "They're always a bit on the down side—if it isn't weather, it's prices; and if it isn't prices, it's weather. I should say George just what they call scrats along—doesn't make much and doesn't lose much."

"Poorish man?" asked White, laconi cally. ' -

"That's about it," the landlord with candour. "Just pays his way." "Wed man, of course?" demanded the inquirer. "Any children?" "Half a dozen of 'em," replied the landlord. "All youngish." Mr White pulled out a fine cigar-case and selected a cigar. "There was somebody asked me to inquire," he observed. "You needn't say anything, you knoWj if this George Mallows should happen to come in."

"Just so, sir," agreed the landlord. "Ah! now, I was wondering if you should happen to be George's uncle that he talks so much about —his Uncle Thomas in America?" m ■ —• [ . "Has he an Uncle Thomas in America?" asked Mr. White. The landlord smiled, and leant confidentially over the bar.i "If you heard George talk]" he. said, "you'd pet the impression that America belongs to his Uncle Thomas. His Uncle Thomas in America is a millionaire. According to George his Uncle Thomas is the man in them parts.. He eats his dinner off gold" plates, and has black niggers to swe?;> the ground in front'of him when he walks out on his estate. It's a common practice, if what George' says is right, for these American millionaires to light their cigars with banknotes. And, of course," he concluded, "when George is telling his tali tales about his Uncle Thomas in America, as he does on market days, there's them as asks why his Uncle Thomas doesn't send a few banknotes this way instead of making pipe-lighters of 'em!" "Sure!" remarked M> White. "And what does George hay to that?" "Oh!" answered the landlord. "He says that his Uncle Thomas knows his own business best, and that if he likes to use his brass in that fashion it's naught to nobody. And, of coarse, there is them as say that George hasn't got no Uncle Thomas in America at all, that it's all make-up and tall talk; but I don't know. And T thought, as you asked after folk of that name, that you mi°;ht be his Uncle Thomas from America." "My name's White, from London," repeated the visitor, shaking hij head. "And now I'm .going to prcscect this old town of yours, and I'll be glad if you'll fix up lunch for precisely, two o'clock." Therewith he marched out, his cigar stuck in the corner of his mouth, and his shrewd eyes twinklins as he stepped into the market-place. For a man who admitted forty yeai"B* absence from a town Mr White showed a surprising knowledge of the nooks and corners of Marcaster. But if anybody had. been watching him closely they would have that he immediately turned his knowledge to practical purposes. True, he cast a fond glance at the old parish church, and an-

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other at the ancient market cross, and a third at the ruins of the castle; but he lingered by "hone df these places just then. Instead, looking about him at the shops and hoyses, he walked straight to a corner of the market-place and turned into a yard wherein were traps, carts, and horses standing about. ' A middleaged, red-cheeked man approached him, touching the brim of his hat. Mr White looked at him narrowly and nodded. "John Dabbs about?" he asked.

The red-cheeked man stared curiously at this laconic question' "Been in the churchyard this five-and-twenty years," he answered.

"Ah!" said Mr White, "I hadn't thought of that. You're his son, I reckon?" " I am, sir," replied the present Dabbs. "And the same trade," observed Mr White. "Carrying, eh? Now, look here, I want you to do a job for me Christmas Day—that's to-morrow. I'll pay extra, as it's Christmas. During to-day there'll be boxes, and parcels sent in here. They'll all bear my name—Mr White. There'll be a lot of 'em. Take care of 'em as they come in. Then, to-morrow morning early, put the lot in a cart, and drive 'em out to Mr George Mallows's farm at Oakdale. I shall be there. Here, I'll pay you now—there's a sovereign. If there's any change you can let your men drink my health'. Merry Christmas!"

Before the carrier could respond Mr White had vanished. He whisked out of the yard and into the market-place. And there, going in and out as if li-« were in the habit of doing it every day, he visited shop after*' shop. He went to the grocer, and to the game-dealer, and to the butcher, and to the wine and spirit merchant ; last of all, he repaired to the toyshop. He" was some time in each, and the various tradesmen N with whom he dealt thought he was the most "liberal and profuse and open-handed gentleman they had ever met, and certainly one who seemed to carry the Bank of England in his pocket. From all these establishments large boxes and parcels issued during the afternoon to Dabbs the carrier. Each was duly labelled in large letters, "White, Esquire, care of.Dabbs." . Meanwhile Mr White had returned to his hotel, where he was duly served with what he"called a real old-fashioned English lunch. He enjoyed himself greatly during its consumption; afterwards he placed his bandana handkerchief over his head and took what he termed forty winks, and was in reality an hour's comfortable sleep. When he woke the whiter afternoon was changing to the dusk* of evening, and, noticing this, Mr White decided that the time had come for the next episode in his carefully-planned operations. He went into his bedroom and locked the door.

Mr White's next proceedings were decide'dly peculiar. His piles of luggage had been carefully placed in his room. -Out of his fine leather suit-cases and portmanteaux he picked a queer old carpet-bag, much worn, but furnished with a stout lock. From that bag, duly opened, he drew out certain very old garments, so old, and so worn, and so travel-stained, that it was not only a wonder any man should carry them about, but that he did not*present them to a scarecrow. They were, in short, no better than the clothes of the average tramp, and only Mr White knew that he had caused them to be carefully cleaned, dilapidated as they were, before putting them: safely away in that old bag many a long year before. They were precious to him, however; he had worn them at a stage of his fortunes when he was dead broke. And now he took off all his fine clothes and fine linen and arrayed himself in a coarse shirt, a neck-muffler, and these ancient garments, and looked a vastly different man. But it would never do for" the people downstairs to see him like this. Accordingly, having first locked up all his valuables—with the one important exception of a very fat purse,—he covered himself from head to foot in a travelling ulster which concealed his old clothes, and 4hen, having drawn a cai> over his head, he went down to the bar. And, having told the landlady that he might not be in that night, nor the next day, as he was going to call on a friend, who would probably detain him for Christmas, he sallied forth into the winter evening, and, getting a cab at the corner of the market-place, bade its driver take him to the end of Oakdale Village. It was a six-mile drive to Oakdale, and Oakdale- itself, once arrived at, was a very lonely and quiet place. But Air White, set down at its outskirts, and left to do his further travels on foot, appeared to be very well acquainted with it as he made his' way along its one street, under a gentle fall of soft snow. In the darkness ho kept looking left and right at the lighted windows of- farmsteads and cottages. As he passed the wall of the churchyard he looked over. it and sighed a little; finally, as unerringly as if he had been in the place only the day before, he turned in at the gate of a farmhouse which stood amongst elms and beeohes a little back from the road. He walked towards its lighted-windows until he reached the door of a barn. Into that door he turned. And within the-barn he took off his ulster coat and hid it under the straw;

then, with a chuckle, he went on to the door of the house and, after a moment's hesitation, knocked gently. A tal), simple-faced man opened the door and let a- flood of lamplight out on what certainly looked to be a tramp. The tramp looked at him and spoke timidly. " Good-evening," he said. " I—perhaps I can come in ? I—l'm your Uncle Thomas from America. You'll be my nephew George." The man at the door let out an exclamation of intense surprise, and immediately stretched out an enormous hand and drew Uncle Thomas inside to a warm fire and an old-fashioned parlour. He shut the door and opened his mouth in amazement, Avhich evidently deepened as his eyes took in his relation's appearance. "Ye don't say!" he exclaimed. "Nay! Well! Uncle Thomas ! Nay ! I see it is, an' all! I can see t' family likeness. Well, I never did! (By gow! I'm right glad to see yer', Uncle Thomas —I am so! Sit yer down i' t' old armchair there. Will —will you have summat to drink?'' "Thank you kindly, George," said Uncle Thomas, seating himself in an ancient chair wherein many of his ancestors had taken their ease. " I shouldn't object to a drop of something." Uncle and nephew looked at each other presently over the rims of their glasses. The nephew lifted his hospitality. " Well, as I say, I'm reight glad to see yer! Ye've come to Christmas wi' us, of course, Uncle Thomas ? Dal me! it's a fair surprise, is this here. I mun call t' missis and t' childer in. Uncle Tho^nas —fro' America! Nay! it beats all." " George," said Uncle Thomas, looking down, " you see I'm —well, not over well dressed—what! You couldn't lend me a suit of your clothes to put on before I see your wife and children, could you? Family's sake, you know." George swallowed the contents of his tumbler at a gulp, jumped up, snatched a candlestick from the sideboard, and took Uncle Thomas by the arm. "Ye can put two suits on if ye 'ike!" he said. "Come on wi' me to my cha'mer; I'll fit yer up, Uncle Thomas. Owt 'at ye like to ax for."

He led Uncle Thomas upstairs, got him out a broadcloth suit, with a remark that the trousers might be a bit long, in the legs but they would turn up; and, bidding him come down when he was ready, went down himself, still' wide-eyed and open-mouthed with astonishment, to call his wife and the elder children and tell them the news.

" It's my Uncle Thomas, fro' America !" he whispered. " He's upstairs. I don't know how it can be, but he looked like a reight ooor man, and I've lent him my Sunday clothes. - Happen he's lost all his brass in one of these here fy nan-shall crisses, .&& they call 'era. However, ye mustn't none on yer take no notice. Pretend 'at ye don't notice nowt. Brass or no brass,'it's my Uncle Thomas!"

Uncle Thomas from America came down into the midst of an excited family circle. There was George's wife —she was even more hospitable than George. There were George's children—six of them. The eldest was eighteen, the youngest was five. Also there was a high tea —such as Uncle Thomas from America had not set eyes, on for forty years. Everybody wanted Uncle Thomas to sit by him or her. And when the high tea was over, there was a bright fire to sit bv, and the old armchair, and a drop of something to drink, and a pipe of tobacco, and talk about old times andywho was dead and who living; and nobody asked Uncle Thomas where all his brass had gone to. Uncle Thomas slept that night in the bed in which his own father, and his father before him, had slept—and died, too. Before he got into it he looked at the old dimity bedhangings and remembered the day on which his mother had put them up for the first time. Hie chuckled to himself a great deal when he was safe between the lavender-scented sheets. But he slept soundly, and when he awoke it was to hear' the waits singing under the farmhouse windows on the Cliristmas morning. And, hearing that, Uncle Thomas got quietly out of bed, slipped on some clothing, and went downstairs.

George Mallows, waking presently, turned to.his wife. "Who's that talking down i' t' kitchen?" he asked sleepily. "Ah! I know —it'll be my Uncle Thomas talkin' to them singers! There'll be one or two on 'em that'll remember him—some o' t' older men. They seem to be set up, an' all!" Bursts of delighted laughter kept sounding from the kitchen where Uncle Thomas was evidently talking to the waits; and it seemed that he was imparting tidings of good cheer .to them. And presently, when they all trooped off, they paused in the garden to give three hearty cheers, which made Mrs George exclaim : "Whatever can have happened!" "Nay, it's nowt!" replied George. "They're cheerin' 'cause my Uncle Thomas has come back fro' America, d'ye see?"

Mrs George, considerably puzzled, did not see, but she was too wise to sav so. She was till more puzzled when, sitting down with her husband and children and Uncle Thomas to the Christmas breakfast, she found something under her plate one glance at which made her rosy face turn pale. "Heaven ha' mercy on us!''"she cried. "Whatever's this? A bank-note for a thousand -pound ! What " "There's something under father's plate, too!" piped one of the children. "I can see it."

George's face turned very white, too, as he drew out his Christmas-box and stared at it. Ho gazed at Uncle Thomas. And Uncle Thomas laughed, and clap-ped him on the shoulder, <ind, despite his forty years of absence, broke into his native speech. "It's all reisht. mi lad, all reight!" he said. "It'll do to light your cigar with, and the missus can use hers for a. curl-paper—there's plenty more where them come from. And now, dang my

buttons, we'll have a reight merry Christmas Hooray!" That day, at noon, the landlord of the White Elephant received .a brief letter in which a five-pound note was enclosed. " Dear sir," it said, " please give the bearer all my luggage. Enclosed is in settlement of my bill.—Yours, Mr White, of London; otherwise Uncle Thomas from America." The End.