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THE CHINA MAIL FRIDAY SUPPLEMENT, OCTOBER 4, 1940.
SHORT STORY O
A Lucifo Match by Arthur Morrison
PERSONS with a choice of sev new idea of the shopkeeper
eral names are not common Johnson considered pockets ac- outside the peeragé; but some of cording to ideau of his own; hay- them-wholly unconnected with ing a natural human preferenco any peer-are to be discovered for the easiest pocket in the most in London crowds, though discov. sumptuous habiliment. ery is not what they are there He felt himself much drawn to- for. Crowds, in fact, attract ward a man in an “immensikott them, from the circumstance that a fur-lined overcoat which was whatever the number of individ-quite the most magnificent gure uals in a crowd; there are surement in the crowd.
to be several times that munber The large side-pocket of the of pockets, mostly with some "imménsikoff" gaped invitingly thing in them; and a pickpocket and, though outside overcoat-poc- who has once been convicted kets were barren as a rule, this flrids a change of name a wise was so very easy that it were precaution. So we arrive at wásting a chance not to try it. So Johnsóu.
Johnson placed himself against the pocket and tried, with unex- pected success.
For indeed, at the bottom of that pocket reposed a purse--not at all what one might expect to And there. In an instant
that
purse was transferred to the out-confronted by the man in the fur- side pocket, so closely adjacent, lined coat.
conviction under the name Jenkin- son eh?
Johnson obediently stumbled dris to the dark opening, and the door: Twasn't exactly a conviction, slammed behind him with a bang sir. I assure you," protested the "nd a sharp.click” It was black sweating pickpocket. The judge's blacker than ever, but at least ho mistake entirely-quité a misun- was alone for a space, and might derstanding and the commonest colleet his faculties. He reached watch you ever see, not worth a about him, and had no difficulty bob!!
in finding the walls of his prison, for in fact they were scarce a sard apart in any direction." "It' seemed that he was in a wooden- cupboard, with, a ledge for a seat. He sat on the ledge and wondered.
"And what... did you get?,
+year
"No, uir-nothing of the kind. It's a wicked slander, sr, when anybody says it was a year. Not a day more than nine months, I give you, my solemn word!"
"After a dozen previous con- victions?"
Imprisonment was not wholly a novelty, though this was certain- ly the darkest cell he had ever inhabited, and the smallest. There was to be an hour's respite, it "No, sir-that's another sland- seemed, but he was mighty uni- er; anybody as told you that is easy as to what would happen at trying to take my character away. the end of the hour. He thought There wasn't more than seven, again of that horrible beetle, and sir, or eight at the very most..It's the clothes tingled, on his skin at 'ard to be scandalised like that, the recollection, till he began to sir?"
rub himself all over. Heavens! if "Shocking!" The stranger had there were more of them in this slipped his purse away and now place! had his hand on Johnson's should-
به
He found it and spilt It, stooped for it hurriedly, butted his head into one side of the cupboard, and his opposite end into the other,
came to the floor in a heap. "Now then, keep quiet in there!” The volee, was a strange one--. certainly not that of the dark man
It chanced that Johnson stood in quite a small crowd--perhaps of twenty-that stared at a shop. windoly' in Oxford Street. He had only been Johnson for a week poor fellow, since emerging from some months retirement, and as yet the name did not sit easily. He had to keep it continually in of Jolinson's light overcoat; and The inan was grinning at him mind, Test in some unforeseen then Johnson paused for a mo with sardonic politeness, and emergency he might call himself merit, ostentatiously scratching his Johnson did not like him at all. er, with finger and thumb taking himself, and stamped, and
He jumped to his feet, shook then Jones, for Barker, or Jenkinson. cheek with the guilty hand, and He was tall and broad and dark a good nip of his coat-collar, "Only bethought him of his match-box. any one of which was dangerous, staring with rapt eyes at the win-while Johnson was small and seven or eight convictions! Poor and had been discarded in its dow; till he judged it expedient narrow and pale. The stranger's chap! you shall have another at turn for that reason; always after to edge gently away and evapor- black moustache was waxed into once. Come along" just such another holiday as that ate from the little crowd
long spikes, which pointed to- "No, indeed, sirlet me alone! he had lately disenjoyed.
He strolled easily to the next ward the outward edges of the On my solemn davy, sin, it was Johnson was a mild person turning turned up it with quicker fat brim of a very tall hat, and all a mistake! I dunno how the not at all the sort of man whom steps, and so into a quieter cross gave a touch of the unearthly to purse got there! And it su- one might suppose to be a pick-street. Here he paused, plunged his grin, and in his hand he ex-prised Johnson to find himself pocket which was fortunate, of his hand into his side-pocket, and tended toward Johnson, a metal offering an excuse with such course, for Johnson. He was a-found, it empty.
box-Johnson's own tobacco-box, deal of truth in it
and it came from-where? No- His chin fell, and he stood in truth, which he now remember- meek, rather timid body, whose
The stranger's grin relaxed: a;
where, about him, but apparently. tastes would have been domestic amazed, There was no doubt of ed to have left in that same side. Little, and his voice grey more from somewhere above, though. if he had been a family man, and it-this was. the pocket into which coat-pocket.
business like. "Very well," he even of this he was not certain.. he would have been a family man he had dropped tin purse, and
said, "Come, with me. for an hour Surely there was no possibility If it were not for the expense. He now there was nothing there.
and I won't charge you.
that he could be watched in this was temperate, thrifty, and inoffen- He felt in the opposite pocket-¦
don't you displease me, my vir unspeakable, darkness! He grup- sive; he shrank with horror from (necdlessly, for he clearly remem- Johnson's panic impulse was to tuous friend!":
ed painfully, found a match, grup- The grin, flicker- the idea of anything violent, such bered working with his right deny his tobacco-box utterly, but ed up again. "Don't you displeased, again, and found the box to as burglary or work; he had no hand, and with his right side-poc- the stranger's black eyes were mo, or you'll go back to as long strike it on vices, no particular abilities, and ket against the left pocket of the piercing his very brain, and he a dose of gaol as I can get you, The light was a great relief, for only one. small talent: he could immensikoff". There was noth-felt it useless. He took the box mind that! You shall buy your in revealed the fact that at least pick a pocket very well indeed. ing now in either of his side-poc- that was forced on him, and release on my terinɛ. Come along! the place was free from visible in- Altogether, Johnson was an un-kets, though he raked them gasped unintelligibly. he was ex-but first stuff those pockets insects. He could 'see now that his usually virtuous thief.
through with anxious fingers. tremely obliged, and didn't know again."
cell was: wooden top, bottom, He stood in a small crowd in And then everything inside hin: he had dropped it; but he never Johnson obeyed, and walked by and sides, and then came. burn- Oxford Street, as I have said, and bounced at the sudden touch of remembered what he did say, the side of his persecutor. In acc fingers and sudden darkness. while the small crowd stared at a hand on his shoulder. He shrank "I believe some sneaking thief maze of sickening bewilderment. He lit another match, and satis- the shop window because of some and turned, and found himself picked your pocket," said the Could he be really awake?. Thefted himself that there was no stranger, his grin growing fiercer. whole thing was uncommonly like cranny,, nor even a keyhole, "Open it and see if anything's a hideous nightinare, down to the through which peeping Was missing."
very beetle. He had the most possible; then he lit another to distinct, recollection of his shock pick up those remaining, and of surprise at finding his coat another after that. pockets empty; yet he had put "Now then!" came the voice the purse, there, and there. it. proved to be after all.
again. "Leave off strikin' them matches!"
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"How de do?" said the sardonic stranger. "Were you feeling, in your pocket for this?"
Johnson began a mumble that it was all right und of no con- sequence and didn't matter, but the eyes and the satanic grin com- pelled him, and he sprang the lid. Instantly there arose from with- in a gigantic creature with horns, which ran across: his hand on horrid clawed legs, and made for his sleeve. Johnson squeaked like a rat, and flung box and insect to the ground together. He had a femining horror of crawling things and had never son a star beetle, before.
But
1
The thing was, the moro, like. a; dream because, his efforts, to re-. Johnson stopped, bumped his member, made. it, all seem like head again, and scrambled to his. something that had opgurred a seat. Then he found courage to long time ago. And he would speak "I say he began. doubtless have believed it
"You stow that nightmare, and made somme des Shut up." perate effort to wake himself sere it not for the fast, that the gloating stronger most palpably had him by the arm as they walk ed: through the bacle streets, and tow and again, put a question of such a purgent and penetrating nature, that demanded; all John son's, waling wits, to meat: it.
row, d'year?
The prisoner said no more.. but walted: Strange noises, resched: his car from some faraway part, of the building, and a little nearer there were subdued creakings. He begun to remember stories of mysterious rooms that closed up and crushed men imprisoned in them::, of weighted ceilings. that fell of chambers slowly filled with prisonous gas:
As he sat he began tu, tremble: and as the minutes passed he felt himself growing desperate with four. He wished he had allowed himself to be handed to the police.
The stranger snatched the box w it fell, and, brushing, roughly against Jobrapa skilfully scooped up the sect from the pavement "What?" he said. "Do you mean to say it wasn't yours, at all? And yet you wanted to take Such wits as Johnson had were it? Is there anything else in Unrely sufficient: for the needs, of those pockets of yours that does, his trade, and now they were on- n't belong to you? Show mol" pressed by a feeling that he was "No,, sir! Nothing at alk sir. being "gott at in some unfathom upon my solemn dog! walind, able manner; for indeed the sat Johnson in terror. For the eyes onie stranger chuckled gaily to and the grin were forcer than himself as the torment went on.. for at least he know what that ever. "Nothing at all, sirli po tested Johnson, pulling out the ponket-linings. And there, as the right-hand pocket came inside cut, emerged the stranger's purse "Liar!" cried the dark man Thief That is my purse?"
He snatched it away and open- ed it, while Johnson stood, helpless In amazement, with his pockets protruding on each side.
Their way led through numermeant. But now he could not ous: backs streets, whiell, Johnson endury much longer. He had was too, cisconcerted to recognise, made up his mind, come what even if he knew them; and at last might, to shout his loudest for they stopped before, a very blank help; when as he stood feeling ard-secret-looking door in a tall the hundredth time for the door- building that had no more than fastening, he was suddenly flung two other openings in it, and those backward and down, confusedly windows, small and high,” . .
realising that the cupboard was The stranger opened the door shooting up bodily. Was the thing. with a latchkey, never looking at: a lift?” the key, but always at Johnson, It.stopped with a jerk, and the with that embarrassing grin un prisoner, recovering his legs, was eltered, unless it were now a, lit-aware of a loud and now familiar tle less fierce and a little more voice; There was a tap at the whimsical. The door revealed door, and a clicks; and instantly, it nothing but a dark passage, into flew open, and Johnson was blind- which Johnson was pushed, with, ed by a food, of light and deafen-.. out ceremonys
ed by a roar of sound,
"Sec!" pursued the stranger, thursting the open purse under his nose "My purse, with my money in it. What about that?”
Instinct brought a jumbled de- ience to Johnson's lips. "Quite a mistake-wouldn't think of such a. thing, being a gentleman: him- self. Accident, that might hap- The place smelt damp, and on
Hundreds of faces stared at him pen to anybody-a lot of trouble the whole strikingly like a cell from a great hall, as many voices, in the family lately and so on in, a police station, a fact, which shouted a delighted greeting and "What's your name?" saapne gave the prisoner's terress a more twice as many hands clapped loud thestranger. It disconcerted definite turn. The door closed applause. The cupboard stand Johnson more than anything else behind then und left them wholly open onu brilliantly lighted stage, to see that this fiendish person the dark; and Johnson, scized and by it stood the sardonic stran- was grinning: more than ever, oy, the arun, was thrust stumble ger in evening dress, with a black while his unavoidable eyes seeming and staggering along the pas wand in his hand, while Johnson. ́op 'to divine mors aliqut. Johnson) rage #81/be emerged on a spot gasping and dishevelled, blinked
than even Johnson -ever knew, only a degree less obscure there and cowered helplessly, "tultat's your name?" he demand nothing was discernible but some “Ladies and gentlemen," cried vast construction. of square kenms the conjurer, "I have the honour that, vanished into blackness. to introduce. Mr. Johnson, alles above. Here the stranger paus-Jones, allas Barker alias Jenkin od, sand, groping in the cloon san, the eminent plckpacket. You re-omong the beams, flung open an-will remember that when I en!
cther door.
closer the lady in the cabinet. I "Get in there," he said, "and sit promised you quite a new and I shan't want you for an original denotioment to the per- nour. You can go to sicep in youformance--something never before fiice"
(Continued on Page 6)
1 “Jones!” spluttered the thick, in & panic. “Barkelno, Jenkinson
I mean. Johnson"
Oh, I soc, the strenger plied and nose his moustache and 11is grin.chaseck ench, other: to, the very tips of his cars. *** Jones, allas Barker, aliaz Jenklu [sion, and at present Johnson. Last