The Literary Dandy

Mr. Pumpkin’s surprisingly aged messenger betrayed an odor of poor man’s goose, sported a burdened crop and mat, and displayed the aesthetic qualities of a bad-hat, a fact which served useful purpose when he undertook his duties in less reputable scrag holes.  While few found him erudite, he would suggest that he did not aspire to be so burdened, and, accordingly, this caused him no embarrassment.  Instead, he was cheerful, none to dull, and quite useful.  His only discernible sins were traceable to his unnatural obsession with bags o’ mystery, Scarborough Simnel, and a pathological adherence to his duties as courier and agent.

Though he had witnessed Mr. Pumpkin’s trembling hands, smelled Mr. Pumpkin’s booze soured breath, and heard an uncommon bravado in Mr. Pumpkin’s inebriated voice, at the time he took the parcel, he was blissfully unaware of both his master’s condition, and the letter’s contents.  Sadly for Mr. Pumpkin, as a proud member of the profession, his messenger was not disposed to discover the insides, as not once in his career had he ever broken wax.  Rather, he was intent on pleasing his master by fulfilling his charge in the most expeditious fashion, and thus hastened on foot towards the center of town, the Good Baron Granger, and Mr. Pumpkin’s impending doom.

In later years, when time had caught up with him, and reason had been replaced by emotion, he came to regret his fastidiousness on that day, believing that if he had full knowledge of the facts and circumstances, the entirety of the tragedy would have been averted.  On the nights leading up to his death, having been consumed by foot rot, he would complain bitterly about this to the gods of irony, such as they were.  When he finally died, having delivered Mr. Pumpkin’s challenge to Baron Granger was his sole regret (though truthfully, and lest the reader confuse him for a saint, he would have had many more regrets had he maintained his mental faculties, and not spent all of his time complaining to the gods of literary devices).

On the day in question, however, his mind was sound and his purpose clear: he was to deliver the message to the good Baron Granger post-haste, and return at once with that man’s reply.  Having his direction, he took the parcel from Mr. Pumpkin’s trembling hands, and proceeded by foot on Wilshire Street, past the still lingering crowd of prattlers, over Carston’s Bridge, through the textile district, and on to the center of town where he expected to find the Baron exercising his gamblous spirit and engaging in his favorite vice.

His progress slowed when, after several blocks, he noticed that his feet had been unceremoniously separated from the ground by a gentleman who was carelessly, and breathlessly, racing in the opposite direction.  The collision sent both men to the walk, and after raising himself up and dusting himself off, the messenger took the measure of the man who had upended him.  The flying gentleman was immediately recognizable by his F.C.’s, polished Wellington’s and heavy silver doormat.

The gentleman in question, such as he was, went by the name Major Strong.  Major Strong found himself panicked when an anticipated delivery had not arrived at the appointed hour, and rushed to find the young deaf woman to whom he had entrusted the care of his particular collection of undergarments.  He feared the worst: that the laundress had discovered his secret and, far from removing the evidence of his activities (as he has ordered), had in fact transferred custody to a constable, or, even worse, to the true owners of the <em>Rattler</em>.  Having proffered sufficient apology to the messenger, he returned to foot so that he could ascertain the whereabouts of the woman, and the status of his bailment.

It perhaps goes without comment that the illicit undergarments that were the cause of all this trouble belonged to Major Nathaniel Strong.  The reader may be surprised to learn that neither his mother, nor the British Army, would have recognized him by that name.  His father certainly would have recognized that name, but would not have assigned it to his son.  Major Strong, such as he was, was believed by many to have been a hero of the Crimean War, an idea that he eschewed in public and secretly encouraged through the ubiquitous display of his dual affectations: his Wellingtons and his burly Crimean doormat.

In truth, his name was not Nathaniel Strong, but Thadeus Dickendasher (yes, dear reader, that Thadeus Dickendasher!).  In truth, not only had he never been to the Crimean Peninsula, he was born just 9 months after the start of the conflict.  In truth, not only was he never an officer, his only brush with the British Army occurred when he was held as a prisoner, and traitor to the Crown.  In truth, it was only his striking resemblance to the authentic Major Strong, and each party’s willingness to assume the other party’s identity that saved him from the gallows.

The real Major Strong was, of course, a hero of the Crimean War, and the father of young Thadeus, having left Ms. Dickendasher with child prior to leaving for war.  When he learned that Thadeus was his son, Major Nathaniel Strong, hero, gave everything he had so that his son could be free.  When he went to the gallows in his son’s place, he did so without regret, though, had he known what kind of man his son would become, he likely would have been filled with it.

After switching places with his father, young Thaddeus grew a beard, which he dyed to silver, to conceal his youthful appearance, and to convince others that he had served in the Crimean War.  He adopted the aesthetics common to men of his father’s stature, and settled into his father’s estate.  After a time he sought greater rewards.  Having an old man’s purse, a war hero’s reputation, and a young man’s vigor, he traded in the most profitable industries of his day: cotton textiles, and the illegal transport of human cargo.  He made a small fortune, and he married a woman who was thought to be 20 years his junior.  In those times, that was the proper order of things.

In any event, on the day we visit him, young Thadeus, or old Major Strong (depending on the reader’s preference) was making haste to the Commons.  After colliding with Mr. Pumpkin’s messenger, he returned to boots, and flew as with a hawk hood.  Unaware of his breath or the pounding in his chest he reached the Commons.  There, to his horror, he saw the gendarme gathered around in a circle, with the tallest holding up to the sunlight a pair of white silk breeches with the letters ELM monogrammed in clear black stitching right below a heather green bow.  What Major Strong knew then, but that the constabulary would not discover for some time, was that those particular undergarments belonged to a young woman who had disappeared several months earlier.

Major Strong considered the laundry in question to be hard won booty, and was disinclined to part with them.  As evidence of his dark dealings, he had brought them to the deaf woman precisely because considered her incapable of betrayal, in no small part on account of her disability.  Of course, he had never imagined that Baron Granger would strike the young woman while she was making delivery, or that the fracas would cause both the garments, and the bill of sale, to be exposed to the light of day.  So it is with such matters.  Though he felt a gravitational pull from the garments, he knew where valor’s better part lay, and so abandoned his trophies and took flight into the back alleys lest his presence raise suspicion.

Later, as the reader already knows, he would try to explain under oath how the garments came into his possession.  He successfully crafted a story that would destroy his marriage, but save his identity and reputation.  Major Strong, as with most men of his time, would find that exchange to be satisfactory.  His tale of philandering, however, did nothing to save his life.  The reader can assume that he did not find that exchange to be to his liking.   At that precise moment, however, he remained very much alive, and was determined to remain so.