MY SUNDAY AT HOME
a blue and brimming glass from the lavatory compartment. The guard I found scratching his head unofficially, by the engine, and murmuring: "Well, I put a bottle of medicine off at Andover—I 'm sure I did."
"Better say it again, any'ow," said the driver. "Orders is orders. Say it again."
Once more the guard paced back, I, anxious to attract his attention, trotting at his heels.
"In a minute—in a minute, sir," he said, waving an arm capable of starting all the traffic on the London and Southwestern Railway at a wave. "Has any gentleman here got a bottle of medicine? A gentleman has taken a bottle of poison (laudanum) by mistake."
"Where 's the man?" I gasped.
"Woking. 'Ere 's my orders." He showed me the telegram, on which were the words to be said. "'E must have left 'is bottle in the train, an' took another by mistake. 'E 's been wirin' from Woking awful, an', now I come to think of it, I 'm nearly sure I put a bottle of medicine off at Andover."
"Then the man that took the poison is n't in the train?"
"Lord, no, sir. No one did n't take poison that way. 'E took it away with 'im, in 'is 'ands. 'E 's wirin' from Wokin'. My orders was to ask everybody in the train, and I 'ave, an' we 're four minutes late now. Are you comin' on, sir? No? Right be'ind!"
There is nothing, unless, perhaps, the English language, more terrible than the workings of an English railway-line. An instant before it seemed as though we were going to spend all eternity at Framlynghame
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