Maria's blue eyes wheeled half a circle towards Tim. She did not move
her head. It signified agreement. Tim knew. Only her consent, as the
insulted party, was necessary before he could approve.
"All right," he cried to Judy. "We'll put him in a special carriage
with his horse, and I'll make out a label for the window, so that every
one will know." He went over to the table and wrote "BEAST" in capital
letters on a half-sheet of paper. The cumbersome quill pen made two
spongy blots.
"It's the end of the world _really_ at the same time," decided Judy, to
a chorus of general approval, "not only the end of Mr. Jinks." She
liked her horrors on a proper scale.
And the railway line was quickly laid across the room from the window
to the wall. The lamps of oil on both engines were lit. The trains
faced one another. Mr. Jinks and his scarlet horse thought themselves
quite safe in their special carriage, unaware that it was labelled
"Beast" with a label that overlapped the roof and hid all view of the
landscape through the windows on one side. Apparently they slept in
opposite corners, with full consciousness of complete security. Mr.
Jinks was tucked up with woolly rugs, and a newspaper lay across his
knee. The scarlet horse had its head in a bag of oats, and its bridle
was fastened to the luggage rack above. Both were supplied with iron
foot-warmers. There was a _fearful_ fog; and the train was going at a
_TREMENDOUS_ pace.
So was the other train. They approached, they banged, they smashed to
atoms. It was the most appalling collision that had ever been heard of,
and the Guard and Engine-Driver, as well as the Ticket-Collectors and
Directors of the Company, were all executed by the Government the very
next day from gallows that an angry London built in half an hour on the
top of St. Paul's Cathedral dome.
It took place between the footstool and the fireplace in the thickest
fog that England had ever known. And the horrid black heart of Mr.
Jinks was discovered beneath the wreckage of a special carriage next to
the luggage van. It was simply black as coal and very nasty indeed. The
little boy who found it was a porter's son, whose mother was so poor
that she took in washing for members of Parliament, who paid their
bills irregularly because they were very busy governing Ireland. He
knew it was a cinder, but did not discover it was a heart until he
showed it to his mother, and his mother said it was far too black to
wash.
The accident to Mr. Jinks, therefore, was a complete success. The
butler helped with the mending of the engine, and Maria informed at
least one Authority, "We do not know Mr. Jinks. We have other friends."
"But, remember," said Judy, "we mustn't mention it to Daddy, because
Mr. Jinks is his partner-in-the-offiss."
"_Was_," said Tim. The remains they decided to send to what they called
the "Hospital for Parilysed Ineebrits with Incurable Afflictions of the
Heart."
CHAPTER IV
FACT--EDGED WITH FANCY
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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