Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/134

27, 1861.] of question and answer, parts easily, parts on the contrary, in broken sentences. To avoid all that, I shall make my friend Frank Stonhouse appear to write the tale connectedly throughout. He as chief actor speaks in the first person. I vanish, good reader, entirely from the scene, and beg you to listen to Frank.

“Pray, sir, are you a gentleman?” What a strange question to be asked. It never but once before in my life was put to me, and then at school by a bigger boy than myself, whom I immediately knocked down—but coming from a young lady’s lips what could it mean? What was I to answer? Be it known, then, that in the year 18—, I, a young man just called to the bar, had, in spite of the remonstrances of an angry porter, jumped into a first-class carriage of an express train starting from Reigate to London, when it was actually in motion. Seated alone in the carriage was a young lady, about nineteen years old; very pretty, light hair, blue eyes, &c. She was evidently in distress, and I fancied wished me elsewhere. After the lapse of a few moments the question was repeated by my fair interrogator—“Pray, sir, are you a gentleman?” I was about to answer in a bantering tone and manner, when it struck me that her voice had almost faltered as she spoke, and that whatever her motive was she was at any rate in earnest.

“Madam,” I replied, “your question is a strange one, but I believe I may say I am a gentleman; still, if you will tell me what you mean by a gentleman, I will answer you with greater certainty than at present I am able to do.”

“Sir, my idea of a gentleman is that of one who not only will not take advantage of a lady in distress, but will assist her to the utmost of his power.”

“Then, madam, I can assure you I am a gentleman.”

“Then, sir, will you be kind enough to put your head out of the opposite window, and not look back till I call you.”

I rose to obey, wondering what it could mean, and almost glancing at her to see if she were a robber in disguise. All that she had with her in the carriage was a large bundle.

“Stop, sir,” said she, “it is perhaps but right that I should tell you this much. I am running away from my home near Reigate. It is a matter of worse than life and death with me. The train does not stop between Reigate and London, but I shall most infallibly be pursued by the electric telegraph, and detected at the terminus, unless I can contrive by disguising myself to deceive those who will search for me. I give you the word of a lady, that in doing what I am driven to do, I am not acting in any way wrongly,—more I cannot tell you.”

She burst into tears, and after a hysterical sob or two, she said, pointing to the window, “And now, sir, will you be kind enough to prove yourself a gentleman, and accede to my request—I am going to change my dress.”

I at once arose, and I can safely aver that the longest ten minutes I ever spent in my life were