Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished: A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure. Robert Michael Ballantyne
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agreed to accept this compromise. The helmet and truncheon were put to their proper uses, and the merciful police-constable went out “on duty.”
Chapter Six.
Wealth pays a Visit to Poverty
It was an interesting sight to watch police-constable Number 666 as he went through the performance of his arduous duties that day at the Regent Circus in Oxford Street.
To those who are unacquainted with London, it may be necessary to remark that this circus is one of those great centres of traffic where two main arteries cross and tend to cause so much obstruction, that complete stoppages would become frequent were it not for the admirable management of the several members of the police force who are stationed there to keep order. The “Oxford Circus,” as it is sometimes called, is by no means the largest or most crowded of such crossings, nevertheless the tide of traffic is sufficiently strong and continuous there to require several police-constables on constant duty. When men are detailed for such “Fixed-Point” duty they go on it for a month at a time, and have different hours from the other men, namely, from nine in the morning till five in the afternoon.
We have said it was interesting to watch our big hero, Number 666, in the performance of his arduous duties. He occupied the crossing on the city side of the circus.
It was a magnificent afternoon, and all the metropolitan butterflies were out. Busses flowed on in a continuous stream, looking like big bullies who incline to use their weight and strength to crush through all obstruction. The drivers of these were for the most part wise men, and restrained themselves and their steeds. In one or two instances, where the drivers were unwise, a glance from the bright eye of Giles Scott was quite sufficient to keep all right.
And Giles could only afford to bestow a fragmentary glance at any time on the refractory, for, almost at one and the same moment he had to check the impetuous, hold up a warning hand to the unruly, rescue a runaway child from innumerable horse-legs, pilot a stout but timid lady from what we may call refuge-island, in the middle of the roadway, to the pavement, answer an imbecile’s question as to the whereabouts of the Tower or Saint Paul’s, order a loitering cabby to move on, and look out for his own toes, as well as give moderate attention to the carriage-poles which perpetually threatened the small of his own back.
We should imagine that the premium of insurance on the life of Number 666 was fabulous in amount, but cannot tell.
Besides his great height, Giles possessed a drooping moustache, which added much to his dignified appearance. He was also imperturbably grave, except when offering aid to a lady or a little child, on which occasions the faintest symptoms of a smile floated for a moment on his visage like an April sunbeam. At all other times his expression was that of incorruptible justice and awful immobility. No amount of chaff, no quantity of abuse, no kind of flattery, no sort of threat could move him any more than the seething billows of the Mediterranean can move Gibraltar. Costermongers growled at him hopelessly. Irate cabmen saw that their wisdom lay in submission. Criminals felt that once in his grasp their case was hopeless, just as, conversely, old ladies felt that once under his protection they were in absolute security. Even street-boys felt that references to “bobbies,” “coppers,” and “slops;” questions as to how ’is ’ead felt up there; who rolled ’im hout so long; whether his mother knew ’e was hout; whether ’e’d sell ’em a bit of ’is legs; with advice to come down off the ladder, or to go ’ome to bed—that all these were utterly thrown away and lost upon Giles Scott.
The garb of the London policeman is not, as every one knows, founded on the principles of aesthetics. Neither has it been devised on utilitarian principles. Indeed we doubt whether the originator of it, (and we are happy to profess ignorance of his name), proceeded on any principle whatever, except the gratification of a wild and degraded fancy. The colour, of course, is not objectionable, and the helmet might be worse, but the tunic is such that the idea of grace or elegance may not consist with it.
We mention these facts because Giles Scott was so well-made that he forced his tunic to look well, and thus added one more to the already numerous “exceptions” which are said to “prove the rule.”
“Allow me, madam,” said Giles, offering his right-hand to an elderly female, who, having screwed up her courage to make a rush, got into sudden danger and became mentally hysterical in the midst of a conglomerate of hoofs, poles, horse-heads, and wheels.
The female allowed him, and the result was sudden safety, a gasp of relief, and departure of hysteria.
“Not yet, please,” said Giles, holding up a warning right-hand to the crowd on refuge-island, while with his left waving gently to and fro he gave permission to the mighty stream to flow. “Now,” he added, holding up the left-hand suddenly. The stream was stopped as abruptly as were the waters of Jordan in days of old, and the storm-staid crew on refuge-island made a rush for the mainland. It was a trifling matter to most of them that rush, but of serious moment to the few whose limbs had lost their elasticity, or whose minds could not shake off the memory of the fact that between 200 and 300 lives are lost in London streets by accidents every year, and that between 3000 and 4000 are more or less severely injured annually.
Before the human stream had got quite across, an impatient hansom made a push. The eagle eye of Number 666 had observed the intention, and in a moment his gigantic figure stood calmly in front of the horse, whose head was raised high above his helmet as the driver tightened the reins violently.
Just then a small slipshod girl made an anxious dash from refuge-island, lost courage, and turned to run back, changed her mind, got bewildered, stopped suddenly and yelled.
Giles caught her by the arm, bore her to the pavement, and turned, just in time to see the hansom dash on in the hope of being overlooked. Vain hope! Number 666 saw the number of the hansom, booked it in his memory while he assisted in raising up an old gentleman who had been overturned, though not injured, in endeavouring to avoid it.
During the lull—for there are lulls in the rush of London traffic, as in the storms of nature,—Giles transferred the number of that hansom to his note-book, thereby laying up a little treat for its driver in the shape of a little trial the next day terminating, probably, with a fine.
Towards five in the afternoon the strain of all this began to tell even on the powerful frame of Giles Scott, but no symptom did he show of fatigue, and so much reserve force did he possess that it is probable he would have exhibited as calm and unwearied a front if he had remained on duty for eighteen hours instead of eight.
About that hour, also, there came an unusual glut to the traffic, in the form of a troop of the horse-guards. These magnificent creatures, resplendent in glittering steel, white plumes, and black boots, were passing westward. Giles stood in front of the arrested stream. A number of people stood, as it were, under his shadow. Refuge-island was overflowing. Comments, chiefly eulogistic, were being freely made and some impatience was being manifested by drivers, when a little shriek was heard, and a child’s voice exclaimed:—
“Oh! papa, papa—there’s my policeman—the one I so nearly killed. He’s not dead after all!”
Giles forgot his dignity for one moment, and, looking round, met the eager gaze of little Di Brandon.
Another moment and duty required his undivided attention, so that he lost sight of her, but Di took good care not to lose sight of him.
“We will wait here, darling,” said her father, referring to refuge-island on which he stood, “and when he is disengaged we can speak to him.”
“Oh! I’m so glad he’s not dead,” said little Di, “and p’raps he’ll be able to show us the way to my boy’s home.”
Di had a method of adopting, in a motherly way, all who, in the remotest manner, came into her life. Thus she not only spoke of our butcher and our baker, which was natural, but referred to “my policeman” and “my boy” ever since the day of the accident.
When Giles had set his portion of the traffic in harmonious motion he returned to his island, and was not sorry to receive the dignified greeting of Sir Richard Brandon, while he was delighted as well as amused by the enthusiastic grasp with