Not George Washington — an Autobiographical Novel by Westbrook and Wodehouse (best time to read books txt) 📕

We turned from Bedford Street eastwards along the Strand.

Between one and two the Strand is as empty as it ever is. It is given over to lurchers and policemen. Fleet Street reproduces for this one hour the Sahara.

"When I knock at the Temple gate late at night," said Malim, "and am admitted by the night porter, I always feel a pleasantly archaic touch."

I agreed with him. The process seemed a quaint admixture of an Oxford or Cambridge college, Gottingen, and a feudal keep. And after the gate had been closed behind one, it was difficult to realise that within a few yards of an academic system of lawns and buildings full of living traditions and associations which wainscoting and winding stairs engender, lay the modern world, its American invaders, its new humour, its women's clubs, its long firms, its musical comedies, its Park Lane, and its Strand with the hub of the universe projecting from the roadway at Charing Cross, plain for Englishmen to gloat over and for foreigners to envy.

Sixty-two Harcourt Buildings is emblazoned with many names, including that of the Rev. John Hatton. The oak was not sported, and our rap at the inner door was immediately answered by a shout of "Come in!" As we opened it we heard a peculiar whirring sound. "Road skates," said Hatton, gracefully circling the table and then coming to a standstill. I was introduced. "I'm very glad to see you both," he said. "The two other men I share these rooms with have gone away, so I'm killing time by training for my road-skate tour abroad. It's trying for one's ankles."

"Could you go downstairs on them?" said Malim.

"Certainly," he replied, "I'll do so now. And when we're down, I'll have a little practice in the open."

Whereupon he skated to the landing, scrambled down the stairs, sped up Middle Temple Lane, and called the porter to let us out into Fleet Street. He struck me as a man who differed in some respects from the popular conception of a curate.

"I'll race you to Ludgate Circus and back," said the clergyman.

"You're too fast," said Malim; "it must be a handicap."

"We might do it level in a cab," said I, for I saw a hansom crawling towards us.

"Done," said the Rev. John Hatton. "Done, for half-a-crown!"

I climbed into the hansom, and Malim, about to follow me, found that a constable, to whom the soil of the City had given spontaneous birth, was standing at his shoulder. "Wot's the game?" inquired the officer, with tender solicitude.

"A fine night, Perkins," remarked Hatton.

"A fine morning, beggin' your pardon, sir," said the policeman facetiously. He seemed to be an acquaintance of the skater.

"Reliability trials," continued Hatton. "Be good enough to start us, Perkins."

"Very good, sir," said Perkins.

"Drive to Ludgate Circus and back, and beat the gentleman on the skates," said Malim to our driver, who was taking the race as though he assisted at such events in the course of his daily duty.

"Hi shall say, 'Are you ready? Horf!'"

"We shall have Perkins applying to the Jockey Club for Ernest Willoughby's job," whispered Malim.

"Are you ready? Horf!"

Hatton was first off the mark. He raced down the incline to the Circus at a tremendous speed. He was just in sight as he swung laboriously round and headed for home. But meeting him on our outward journey, we noticed that the upward slope was distressing him. "Shall we do it?" we asked.

"Yessir," said our driver. And now we, too, were on the up grade. We went up the hill at a gallop: were equal with Hatton at Fetter Lane, and reached the Temple Gate yards to the good.

The ancient driver of a four-wheeler had been the witness of the finish.

He gazed with displeasure upon us.

"This 'ere's a nice use ter put Fleet Street to, I don't think," he said coldly.

This sarcastic rebuke rather damped us, and after Hatton had paid Malim his half-crown, and had invited me to visit him, we departed.

"Queer chap, Hatton," said Malim as we walked up the Strand.

I was to discover at no distant date that he was distinctly a many-sided man. I have met a good many clergymen in my time, but I have never come across one quite like the Rev. John Hatton.