Adventures of Bindle

"An' very nice too," was Bindle's comment.

"Outside Downing Street," she continued, "you will be met by a lady who will give you the key that opens the doors of the van."

"'Adn't we better take the key now, mum?" Bindle enquired.

"You'll do as you're told, please," was the uncompromising rejoinder.

"Right-o! mum," remarked Bindle cheerily. "Now then, Tippy, let's get these 'ere 'orses in. Which end d'you begin on?"

Tippitt and Bindle silently busied themselves in harnessing the horses to the pantechnicon.

"Now you won't make any mistake," said the lady when everything was completed. "Number 110, Downing Street, Mr. Llewellyn John."

"There ain't goin' to be no mistakes, mum, you may put your 'and on your 'eart," Bindle assured her.

"Cawfee money, mum?" enquired Tippitt. "It's 'ot." Tippitt never wasted words.

"Tippy, Tippy! I'm surprised at you!" Bindle turned upon his colleague reproachfully. "Only twice 'ave you spoke to-day, an' the second time's to beg. I'm sorry, mum," he said, turning to the lady. "It ain't 'is fault. It's jest 'abit."

The lady hesitated for a moment, then taking her purse from her bag, handed Bindle a two-shilling piece.

Tippitt eyed it greedily.

With a final admonition not to forget, the lady drove off.

Bindle looked at the coin, spat on it, and put it in his pocket.

"Funny thing 'ow a woman'll give a couple o' bob, where a man'll make it 'alf a dollar," he remarked.

"Wot about me?" enquired Tippitt.

"Wot about you, Tippy?" repeated Bindle. "Well, least said soonest mended. You can't 'elp it."

"But I asked 'er," persisted Tippitt.

"Ah! Tippy," remarked Bindle, "it ain't 'im wot asks; but 'im wot gets. 'Owever, you shall 'ave a stone-ginger at the next stoppin' place. Your ole pal ain't goin' back on you, Tippy."

Without a word, Tippitt climbed up into the driver's seat, whilst Bindle clambered on to the tail-board, where he proceeded to fill his pipe with the air of a man for whom time has no meaning.

"Good job they ain't all like me," he muttered. "I likes a day in the country, now and then; but always! Not me." He struck a match, lighted his pipe and, with a sigh of contentment, composed himself to bucolic meditation.

One of the advantages of the moving-profession in Bindle's eyes was that it gave him hours of leisured ease, whilst the goods were in transit. "You can slack it like a Cuthbert," he would say. "All you 'as to do is to sit on the tail of a van an' watch the world go by —some life that."

Bindle was awakened from his contemplation of the hedges and the white road that ribboned out before his eyes by a man coming out of a gate. At the sight of the pantechnicon he grinned and, with a jerk of his thumb, indicated the van as if it were the greatest joke in the world.

Bindle grinned back, although not quite understanding the cause of the man's amusement.

"'Ot little lot that, mate," remarked the man, stepping off the kerb and walking beside the tailboard.

Bindle looked at him, puzzled at the remark.

"Wot exactly might you be meanin', ole son?" he enquired.

"Oh! come orf of it," said the man. "I won't tell your missis. Like a razzle myself sometimes," and he laughed, obviously amused at this joke.

Bindle slipped off the tail-board and joined the man, who had returned to the pavement.

"You evidently seen a joke wot's caught me on the blind side," he remarked casually.

"A joke," remarked the man; "a whole van-load of jokes, if you was to ask me."

"Well, p'raps you're right," remarked Bindle philosophically, "but if there's as many as all that, I should 'ave thought there'd 'ave been enough for two; but as I say, p'raps you're right. These ain't the times for givin' anythink away, although," he added meditatively, "I 'adn't 'eard of their 'avin' rationed jokes as well as meat and sugar. We shall be 'avin' joke-queues soon," he added. "You seem to be a sort of joke-'og, you do." Bindle turned and regarded his companion with interest.

"You mean to say you don't know wot's inside that there van?" enquired the man incredulously.

"Carved-oak dinin'-room furniture, I been told," replied Bindle indifferently.

The man laughed loudly. Then turned to Bindle. "You mean to say you don't know that van's full o' gals?" he demanded.

"Full o' wot?" exclaimed Bindle, coming to a dead stop. His astonishment was too obvious to leave doubt in the man's mind as to its genuineness.

"Gals an' women," he replied. "Saw 'em gettin' in down the road, out of motors. Dressed in white they was, with coloured sashes over their shoulders. Suffragettes, I should say. They didn't see me though," he added.

Bindle gave vent to a low, prolonged whistle as he resumed his walk.

"'Old me, 'Orace!" he cried happily. "Wot 'ud Mrs. B. say if she knew." Suddenly he paused again, and slapped his knee.

"Well, I'm damned!" he cried. "A raid, of course."

The man looked anxiously up at the blue of the sky.

"It's all right," said Bindle reassuringly. "My mistake; it was a bird."

A few minutes later the man turned off from the main road.

"Hi! Tippy," Bindle hailed, "don't you forget that stone-ginger at the next dairy."

A muttered reply came from Tippitt. Five minutes later he drew up outside a public-house on the outskirts of Wimbledon. Bindle took the opportunity of climbing up on the top of the van, where he gained the information he required. Every inch of the roof was perforated!

"Air-'oles," he muttered with keen satisfaction; "air-'oles, as I'm a miserable sinner," and he clambered down and entered the public-bar, where he convinced Tippitt that his mate could be trusted with money.

When Bindle had drained to the last drop his second pewter, his mind was made up.

"Number 110, Downing Street," he muttered. "White dresses an' coloured sashes. That's it. Well, Joe Bindle, you can't save the bloomin' British Empire from destruction; but you can save the Prime Minister from 'avin' 'is afternoon nap spoilt, leastwise you can try.

"I'm a-goin' for a little stroll, Tippy," he remarked, as he walked towards the door. "Back in ten minutes. If you gets lonely, order another pint an' put it down to me."

"Right-o! mate," replied Tippitt.