James Matthew Barrie - The Complete Works of J. M. Barrie (With Illustrations)

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Musaicum Books presents to you this carefully created volume of «The Complete Works of J. M. Barrie (With Illustrations)». This ebook has been designed and formatted to the highest digital standards and adjusted for readability on all devices.
Sir James Matthew Barrie (1860-1937) is one of the greatest Scottish novelists and playwrights, best remembered as the creator of Peter Pan.
Content:
Peter Pan Adventures
Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens
Peter and Wendy
Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up
When Wendy Grew Up
Novels
Better Dead
When a Man's Single
Auld Licht Idylls
A Window in Thrums
The Little Minister
Sentimental Tommy
Tommy and Grizel
The Little White Bird
Farewell Miss Julie Logan
Novellas
A Tillyloss Scandal
Life in a Country Manse
Lady's Shoe
Short Stories
A Holiday in Bed and Other Sketches
Two of Them and Other Stories
Other Short Stories
Inconsiderate Waiter
The Courting of T'Nowhead's Bell
Dite Deuchars
The Minister's Gown
Shutting a Map
An Invalid in Lodgings
The Mystery of Time-Tables
Mending the Clock
The Biggest Box in the World
The Coming Dramatist
The Result of a Tramp
The Other «Times»
How Gavin Birse Put it to Mag Lownie
The Late Sherlock Holmes
Plays
Ibsen's Ghost
Jane Annie
Walker, London
The Professor's Love Story
The Little Minister: A Play
The Wedding Guest
Little Mary
Quality Street
The Admirable Crichton
What Every Woman Knows
Der Tag (The Tragic Man)
Dear Brutus
Alice Sit-by-the-Fire
A Kiss for Cinderella
Shall We Join the Ladies?
Half an Hour
Seven Women
Old Friends
Mary Rose
The Boy David
Pantaloon
The Twelve-Pound Look
Rosalind
The Will
The Old Lady Shows Her Medals
The New Word
Barbara's Wedding
A Well-Remembered Voice
Essays
Neither Dorking Nor The Abbey
Charles Frohman: A Tribute
Courage
Preface to The Young Visiters
Captain Hook at Eton
The Man from Nowhere
Woman and the Press
A Plea for Smaller Books
Boy's Books
The Lost Works of George Meredith
The Humor of Dickens
Ndintpile Pont(?)…

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'Well, Josephs, I shall have to hand you over to the police.'

'I think not,' said Josephs, in his gentlemanly voice.

'Why not?' asked Dick.

'Because then it would all come out.'

'What would all come out?'

'The way your father was deceived. The society papers would make a great deal of it, and he would not like that.'

Dick groaned, though the other did not hear him.

'You read the society journals, Josephs?'

'Rather!' said Josephs.

'Perhaps you write for them?'

Josephs did not say.

'Well, how were you brought here?' Dick asked.

'Your friend,' said Josephs sulkily, 'came into our place of business in Southampton Row half an hour ago, and saw me. He insisted on bringing me here at once in a cab. I wanted to put on a black coat, but he would not hear of it.'

'Ah, then, I suppose you gave Mr. Angus the full confession of your roguery as you came along?'

'He would not let me speak,' said Josephs. 'He said it was no affair of his.'

'No? Then you will be so good as to favour me with the pretty story.'

Dick lit a cigar and seated himself. The sham baronet looked undecidedly at a chair.

'Certainly not,' said Dick; 'you can stand.'

Josephs told his tale demurely, occasionally with a gleam of humour, and sometimes with a sigh. His ambition to be a gentleman, but with no desire to know the way, had come to him one day in his youth when another gentleman flung a sixpence at him. In a moment Josephs saw what it was to belong to the upper circles. He hurried to a street corner to get his boots blacked, tossed the menial the sixpence, telling him to keep the change, and returned home in an ecstasy, penniless, but with an object in life. That object was to do it again.

At the age of eighteen Josephs slaved merrily during the week, but had never any money by Monday morning. He was a gentleman every Saturday evening. Then he lived; for the remainder of the week he was a barber. One of his delights at this period was to have his hair cut at Truefitt's and complain that it was badly done. Having reproved his attendant in a gentlemanly way, he tipped him handsomely and retired in a glory. It was about this time that he joined a Conservative association.

Soon afterwards Josephs was to be seen in Rotten Row, in elegant apparel, hanging over the railing. He bowed and raised his hat to the ladies who took his fancy, and, though they did not respond, glowed with the sensation of being practically a man of fashion. Then he returned to the shop.

The years glided by, and Josephs discovered that he was perfectly content to remain a hairdresser if he could be a gentleman now and again. Having supped once in a fashionable restaurant, he was satisfied for a fortnight or so with a sausage and onions at home. Then the craving came back. He saved up for two months on one occasion, and then took Saturday to Monday at Cookham, where he passed as Henry K. Talbot Devereux. He was known to the waiters and boatmen there as the gentleman who had quite a pleasure in tossing them half-crowns, and for a month afterwards he had sausage without onions. So far this holiday had been the memory of his life. He studied the manners and language of the gentlemen who came to the shop in which he was employed, and began to dream of a big thing annually. He had learnt long ago that he was remarkably good-looking.

For a whole year Josephs abstained from being a gentleman except in the smallest way, for he was burning to have a handle to his name, and feared that it could not be done at less than twenty pounds. His week's holiday came, and found Josephs not ready for it. He had only twelve pounds. With a self-denial that was magnificent he crushed his aspirations, took only two days of delight at Brighton, and continued to save up for the title. Next summer saw him at the Anglers' Retreat, near Dome Castle. 'Sir Clement Dowton' was the name on his Gladstone bag. A dozen times a day he looked at it till it frightened him, and then he tore the label off. Having done so, he put on a fresh one.

Josephs had selected his baronetcy with due care. Years previously he had been told that he looked like the twin-brother of Sir Clement Dowton, and on inquiry he had learned that the baronet was not in England. As for the Anglers' Retreat, he went there because he had heard that it was frequented by persons in the rank of life to which it was his intention to belong for the next week. He had never heard of Colonel Abinger until they met. The rest is known. Josephs dwelt on his residence at Dome Castle with his eyes shut, like a street-arab lingering lovingly over the grating of a bakery.

'Well, you are a very admirable rogue,' Dick said, when Josephs had brought his story to an end, 'and, though I shall never be proud again, your fluency excuses our blindness. Where did you pick it up?' The barber glowed with gratification.

'It came naturally to me,' he answered. 'I was intended for a gentleman. I dare say, now, I am about the only case on record of a man who took to pickles and French sauces the first time he tried them. Mushrooms were not an acquired taste with me, nor black coffee, nor caviare, nor liqueurs, and I enjoy celery with my cheese. What I liked best of all was the little round glasses you dip your fingers into when the dinner is finished. I dream of them still.'

'You are burst up for the present, Josephs, I presume?'

'Yes, but I shall be able to do something in a small way next Christmas. I should like to put it off till summer, but I can't.'

'There must be no more donning the name of Dowton,' said Dick, trying to be stern.

'I suppose I shall have to give that up,' the barber said with a sigh. 'I had to bolt, you see, last time, before I meant to go.'

'Ah, you have not told me yet the why and wherefore of those sudden disappearances. Excuse my saying so, Josephs, but they were scarcely gentlemanly.'

'I know it,' said Josephs sadly, 'but however carefully one plans a thing, it may take a wrong turning. The first time I was at the castle I meant to leave in a carriage and pair, waving my handkerchief, but it could not be done at the money.'

'The colonel would have sent you to Silchester in his own trap.'

'Ah, I wanted a brougham. You see I had been a little extravagant at the inn, and I could not summon up courage to leave the castle without tipping the servants all round.'

'So you waited till you were penniless, and then stole away?'

'Not quite penniless,' said Josephs; 'I had three pounds left, but——'

He hesitated.

'You see,' he blurted out, blushing at last, 'my old mother is dependent on me, and I kept the three pounds for her.'

Dick took his cigar from his mouth.

'I am sorry to hear this, Josephs,' he said, 'because I meant to box your ears presently, and I don't know that I can do it now. How about the sudden termination to the visit you honoured the colonel with last Christmas?'

'I had to go,' said Josephs, 'because I read that Sir Clement Dowton had returned to England. Besides, I was due at the shop.'

'But you had an elegant time while your money held out?'

Josephs wiped a smile from his face.

'It was grand,' he said. 'I shall never know such days again.'

'I hope not, Josephs. Was there no streak of cloud in those halcyon days?'

The barber sighed heavily.

'Ay, there was,' he said, 'hair oil.'

'Explain yourself, my gentle hairdresser.'

'Gentlemen,' said Josephs, 'don't use hair oil. I can't live without it. That is my only stumbling-block to being a gentleman.'

He put his fingers through his hair, and again Dick sniffed the odour of oil.

'I had several bottles of it with me,' Josephs continued, 'but I dared not use it.'

'This is interesting,' said Dick. 'I should like to know now, from you who have tried both professions, whether you prefer the gentleman to the barber.'

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