Bab Bab 44 · Mysterious Disappearance of Thomas Higgs

. Mysterious Disappearance of Thomas Higgs

Higgs’s factory was a mine of delight for the gossips of Birmingham. It

was a small building but quite large enough to hold a mystery. Who the

proprietor was, or where he came from none could tell. He looked like a

gentleman, that was certain, though everybody knew he had risen from an

apprenticeship, and he could handle his pen like a writing master.

Years ago he had suddenly appeared in the place a lad of eighteen,

learned his trade faithfully, and risen in the confidence of his

employer, been taken in as a partner soon after the time was up.

Finally, when old Willett died, had assumed the business on his own

hands. This was all that was known of his affairs.

It was a common remark among some of the good people that he never had

a word to say to a Christian soul, while others declared that though

he spoke beautifully when he chose to, there was something wrong in

his accent. A tidy man, too, they called him, all but for having that

scandalous green pond alongside of his factory, which wasn’t deep enough

for an eel and was “just a fever nest, as sure as you live.”

His nationality was a great puzzle. The English name spoke plain enough

for ONE side of his house, but of what manner of nation was his mother?

If she’d been an American, he’d certainly have had high cheekbones and

reddish skin; if a German, he would have known the language, and Squire

Smith declared that he didn’t; if French (and his having that frog pond

made it seem likely), it would come out in his speech. No, there was

nothing he could be but Dutch. And, strangest of all, though the man

always pricked up his ears when you talked of Holland, he didn’t seem to

know the first thing about the country when you put him to the point.

Anyhow, as no letters ever came to him from his mother’s family in

Holland, and as nobody living had ever seen old Higgs, the family

couldn’t be anything much. Probably Thomas Higgs himself was no better

than he should be, for all he pretended to carry himself so straight;

and for their parts, the gossips declared, they were not going to

trouble their heads about him. Consequently Thomas Higgs and his affairs

were never-failing subjects of discussion.

Picture, then, the consternation among all the good people when it

was announced by “somebody who was there and ought to know,” that the

postboy had that very morning handed Higgs a foreign-looking letter, and

the man had “turned as white as the wall, rushed to his factory, talked

a bit with one of the head workmen, and without bidding a creature

good-bye, was off bag and baggage, before you could wink, ma’am.”

Mistress Scrubbs, his landlady, was in deep affliction. The dear soul

became quite out of breath while speaking of him. “To leave lodgin’s in

that suddent way, without never so much as a day’s warnin’, which was

what every woman who didn’t wish to be trodden underfoot, which thank

hevving wasn’t HER way, had a perfect right to expect; yes, and a week’s

warnin’ now you mention it, and without even so much as sayin’ ‘Many

thanks, Mistress Scrubbs, for all past kindnesses,’ which was most

numerous, though she said it who shouldn’t say it; leastwise she wasn’t

never no kind of person to be lookin’ for thanks every minnit. It was

really scanderlous, though to be sure Mister ‘iggs paid up everythin’ to

the last farthin’ and it fairly brought tears to my eyes to see his dear

empty boots lyin’ there in the corner of his room, which alone showed

trouble of mind for he always stood ‘em up straight as solgers, though

bein’ half-soled twice they hadn’t, of course, been worth takin’ away.”

Whereupon her dearest friend, Miss Scrumpkins, ran home to tell all

about it. And, as everybody knew the Scrumpkinses, a shining gossamer of

news was soon woven from one end of the street to the other.

An investigating committee met that evening at Mrs. Snigham’s--sitting

in secret session over her best china. Though invited only to a quiet

“tea,” the amount of judicial business they transacted on the occasion

was prodigious. The biscuits were actually cold before the committee had

a chance to eat anything. There was so much to talk over, and it was

so important that it should be firmly established that each member

had always been “certain sure that something extraordinary would be

happening to that man yet,” that it was nearly eight o’clock before Mrs.

Snigham gave anybody a second cup.