The Stolen Bacillus and Other Incidents Read online

  A DEAL IN OSTRICHES

  "Talking of the prices of birds, I've seen an ostrich that cost threehundred pounds," said the Taxidermist, recalling his youth of travel."Three hundred pounds!"

  He looked at me over his spectacles. "I've seen another that wasrefused at four."

  "No," he said, "it wasn't any fancy points. They was just plainostriches. A little off colour, too--owing to dietary. And therewasn't any particular restriction of the demand either. You'd havethought five ostriches would have ruled cheap on an East Indiaman. Butthe point was, one of 'em had swallowed a diamond.

  "The chap it got it off was Sir Mohini Padishah, a tremendous swell, aPiccadilly swell you might say up to the neck of him, and then an uglyblack head and a whopping turban, with this diamond in it. The blessedbird pecked suddenly and had it, and when the chap made a fuss itrealised it had done wrong, I suppose, and went and mixed itself withthe others to preserve its _incog_. It all happened in a minute. I wasamong the first to arrive, and there was this heathen going over hisgods, and two sailors and the man who had charge of the birds laughingfit to split. It was a rummy way of losing a jewel, come to think ofit. The man in charge hadn't been about just at the moment, so that hedidn't know which bird it was. Clean lost, you see. I didn't feel halfsorry, to tell you the truth. The beggar had been swaggering over hisblessed diamond ever since he came aboard.

  "A thing like that goes from stem to stern of a ship in no time. Everyone was talking about it. Padishah went below to hide his feelings.At dinner--he pigged at a table by himself, him and two otherHindoos--the captain kind of jeered at him about it, and he got veryexcited. He turned round and talked into my ear. He would not buy thebirds; he would have his diamond. He demanded his rights as a Britishsubject. His diamond must be found. He was firm upon that. He wouldappeal to the House of Lords. The man in charge of the birds was oneof those wooden-headed chaps you can't get a new idea into anyhow. Herefused any proposal to interfere with the birds by way of medicine.His instructions were to feed them so-and-so and treat them so-and-so,and it was as much as his place was worth not to feed them so-and-soand treat them so-and-so. Padishah had wanted a stomach-pump--thoughyou can't do that to a bird, you know. This Padishah was full of badlaw, like most of these blessed Bengalis, and talked of having a lienon the birds, and so forth. But an old boy, who said his son was aLondon barrister, argued that what a bird swallowed became _ipsofacto_ part of the bird, and that Padishah's only remedy lay inan action for damages, and even then it might be possible to showcontributory negligence. He hadn't any right of way about an ostrichthat didn't belong to him. That upset Padishah extremely, the more soas most of us expressed an opinion that that was the reasonable view.There wasn't any lawyer aboard to settle the matter, so we all talkedpretty free. At last, after Aden, it appears that he came round to thegeneral opinion, and went privately to the man in charge and made anoffer for all five ostriches.

  "The next morning there was a fine shindy at breakfast. The man hadn'tany authority to deal with the birds, and nothing on earth wouldinduce him to sell; but it seems he told Padishah that a Eurasiannamed Potter had already made him an offer, and on that Padishahdenounced Potter before us all. But I think the most of us thought itrather smart of Potter, and I know that when Potter said that he'dwired at Aden to London to buy the birds, and would have an answer atSuez, I cursed pretty richly at a lost opportunity.

  "At Suez, Padishah gave way to tears--actual wet tears--when Potterbecame the owner of the birds, and offered him two hundred and fiftyright off for the five, being more than two hundred per cent. on whatPotter had given. Potter said he'd be hanged if he parted with afeather of them--that he meant to kill them off one by one and findthe diamond; but afterwards, thinking it over, he relented a little.He was a gambling hound, was this Potter, a little queer at cards, andthis kind of prize-packet business must have suited him down to theground. Anyhow, he offered, for a lark, to sell the birds separatelyto separate people by auction at a starting price of L80 for a bird.But one of them, he said, he meant to keep for luck.

  "You must understand this diamond was a valuable one--a little Jewchap, a diamond merchant, who was with us, had put it at three orfour thousand when Padishah had shown it to him--and this idea of anostrich gamble caught on. Now it happened that I'd been having afew talks on general subjects with the man who looked after theseostriches, and quite incidentally he'd said one of the birds wasailing, and he fancied it had indigestion. It had one feather in itstail almost all white, by which I knew it, and so when, next day, theauction started with it, I capped Padishah's eighty-five by ninety.I fancy I was a bit too sure and eager with my bid, and some of theothers spotted the fact that I was in the know. And Padishah went forthat particular bird like an irresponsible lunatic. At last the Jewdiamond merchant got it for L175, and Padishah said L180 just afterthe hammer came down--so Potter declared. At any rate the Jew merchantsecured it, and there and then he got a gun and shot it. Potter made aHades of a fuss because he said it would injure the sale of the otherthree, and Padishah, of course, behaved like an idiot; but all of uswere very much excited. I can tell you I was precious glad when thatdissection was over, and no diamond had turned up--precious glad. I'dgone to one-forty on that particular bird myself.

  "The little Jew was like most Jews--he didn't make any great fuss overbad luck; but Potter declined to go on with the auction until it wasunderstood that the goods could not be delivered until the sale wasover. The little Jew wanted to argue that the case was exceptional,and as the discussion ran pretty even, the thing was postponed untilthe next morning. We had a lively dinner-table that evening, I cantell you, but in the end Potter got his way, since it would stand toreason he would be safer if he stuck to all the birds, and that weowed him some consideration for his sportsmanlike behaviour. And theold gentleman whose son was a lawyer said he'd been thinking the thingover and that it was very doubtful if, when a bird had been opened andthe diamond recovered, it ought not to be handed back to theproper owner. I remember I suggested it came under the laws oftreasure-trove--which was really the truth of the matter. There was ahot argument, and we settled it was certainly foolish to kill the birdon board the ship. Then the old gentleman, going at large through hislegal talk, tried to make out the sale was a lottery and illegal,and appealed to the captain; but Potter said he sold the birds _as_ostriches. He didn't want to sell any diamonds, he said, and didn'toffer that as an inducement. The three birds he put up, to the best ofhis knowledge and belief, did _not_ contain a diamond. It was in theone he kept--so he hoped.

  "Prices ruled high next day all the same. The fact that now there werefour chances instead of five of course caused a rise. The blessedbirds averaged 227, and, oddly enough, this Padishah didn't secure oneof 'em--not one. He made too much shindy, and when he ought to havebeen bidding he was talking about liens, and, besides, Potter was abit down on him. One fell to a quiet little officer chap, another tothe little Jew, and the third was syndicated by the engineers. Andthen Potter seemed suddenly sorry for having sold them, and said he'dflung away a clear thousand pounds, and that very likely he'd draw ablank and that he always had been a fool, but when I went and had abit of a talk to him, with the idea of getting him to hedge on hislast chance, I found he'd already sold the bird he'd reserved to apolitical chap that was on board, a chap who'd been studying Indianmorals and social questions in his vacation. That last was the threehundred pounds bird. Well, they landed three of the blessed creaturesat Brindisi--though the old gentleman said it was a breach of theCustoms regulations--and Potter and Padishah landed too. The Hindooseemed half mad as he saw his blessed diamond going this way andthat, so to speak. He kept on saying he'd get an injunction--he hadinjunction on the brain--and giving his name and address to the chapswho'd bought the birds, so that they'd know where to send the diamond.None of them wanted his name and address, and none of them would givetheir own. It was a fine row I can tell you--on the platform. They allwent off by different trains. I came on to Sout
hampton, and thereI saw the last of the birds, as I came ashore; it was the one theengineers bought, and it was standing up near the bridge, in a kind ofcrate, and looking as leggy and silly a setting for a valuable diamondas ever you saw--if it _was_ a setting for a valuable diamond.

  "_How did it end_? Oh! like that. Well--perhaps. Yes, there's one morething that may throw light on it. A week or so after landing I wasdown Regent-street doing a bit of shopping, and who should I seearm-in-arm and having a purple time of it but Padishah and Potter. Ifyou come to think of it--

  "Yes. _I've_ thought that. Only, you see, there's no doubt the diamondwas real. And Padishah was an eminent Hindoo. I've seen his namein the papers--often. But whether the bird swallowed the diamondcertainly is another matter, as you say."